napali

wow! i have been driving past this tower for 3 months not and every time im on it have never gotten more than .06m down. or anywhere in Milwaukee.

My experience with the speed of that tower has been sitting in the Target parking lot or in the local area sitting in one spot. I don't check speeds while driving. I mostly stay off viewing my phone while moving, I find it to be an unsafe practice. Also, I have gotten the best speeds with my newer Samsung g4, didn't always see over 1mg with my previous phones....   

HEY HEY! That definitely IS news. I think Sprint is the only carrier using that water tower, and there were NO NV panels on there last time I checked a week or so ago. That's awesome news! That's like one of the last few towers in the Western Milwaukee/Waukesha area that hadn't been touched yet. 

 

I hope all those rumblings about Milwaukee market and the end of November are right! I can't wait to see some more action around here.

I can confirm as of this morning this is new and NV is up on the tower sides. That part of the tower neck has been empty forever and the new NV antenna are now there. This is (almost) the last piece of the puzzle for the southwest corner of Waukesha County and I am surprised it took as long as it did. Based on it's location, this will probably be one of the most used towers in the area and it sat dry for so long. I spent some time around the tower today and the 3g service was not as good as it had been in the past. This was a solid 1-1.5m tower for a year or 2 now and it was quite a bit slower today. I saw someone heading into work on it today as a truck was unlocking the gate to the entrance road of the tower. If anyone is familiar with this tower, it is buried on a long (closed) back road and has zero accessibility by the public, probably one of the only ones I know that you cannot actually see the bottom of the tower from any vantage point except a quick glance getting on 1-43 heading east.

My home tower (as I have written before about) is a lost cause at this point. This is the one I have been waiting for (Big Bend/ Vernon off of Cheri Drive and 164) and the latest update from the Town of Vernon (last week)  is that Sprint has still not presented a acceptable upgrade plan to Waukesha County for them to give approval. I am doubting this is Waukesha's issue as other sites have been approved.... I also think a tower on top of High power lines can create an additional delay based on what I have heard..

So... we wait and hope things start switching on SOON...

Can Anybody in Mukwonago confirm that NV is on the I-43 tower out there? I know I found approval from the City way back in Dec 2012 for the upgrade, but I don't get out there enough to check it out... Any Help???? 

On my way home today i was picking up 1x800 and it kept dropping in and out. This was getting off I-43 on Racine avenue heading into Waukesha. I did not get back on 3G until i toggled airplane mode at Hwy 59 & Racine. Looks like we may be getting some action here in Waukesha/New Berlin soon. 

Very interesting and good news... This is right in my work/home area and I am quite sure the tower you would have been hitting has had NV on it for quite a while. This tower is on National about a 1/4 off of Racine and is at a great elevation for the area. The other Muskego Tower heading South on the Water Tower is where I spoke to the Samsung programmer (last week) who said he had been doing a lot of work in this area. Told me twice... look to the end of November... Sounds hopeful.....  

Possible good new update.... Take it for the grain of salt it is ....

Today I drove by the Muskego Water tower (Racine AVE) to verify the finish install of the NV equipment.  As promised the antenna was all in place. As I drove by there was a blue Jeep Cherokee (Ohio plates) backing up to the tower. I saw him parked once before by the Vernon Big Bend tower (nothing up top done there). I stopped and asked him if he was working on behalf of Sprint. He told me he was a Samsung programmer and was going in to do his work. I asked for a timeline on the tower to go live and told me (twice) to watch for the end of the month (Nov). He said he has been all over, but focusing a lot of work in this area lately. He gave the familiar story we have been hearing from others on the ground that it going to be done and activated in clusters. I tried getting additional information out of him, but like the others he was either unsure of the locations I was speaking of, or just did not want to say. This was the first time I ran across an actual Samsung employee and I am not sure if anyone out there knows the timeline from base programming to live?? I was also stunned how quickly this guy was following up on this upgraded site. This water tower was just finished equipment wise late last week. That seems like a good sign... Comments? ???

That "home" tower of yours sure has lousy coverage (Cheri Avenue just south of ES/164).  A good friend of mine lives in a subdivision just west of Morningstar Golf Club on XX and that is the tower that serves it.  You have to do a circus act to find a signal from it that's good enough to use.  I sure was hoping that tower would get the new Samsung equipment before winter but the info you got from the tower crew isn't very good.

 

Interestingly enough, the two towers just south of me that are on power lines have all the new Samsung equipment installed!  But they are in Kenosha County and I think Sprint is pushing LTE in Kenosha & Racine Counties for the benefit of their Chicago customers who trek north of the state line...

No doubt. I am no further the 2 miles as the crow flies from that thing and my reception is average at best. My phone works ok, but it is always riding on the lowers bars in my home. It could be worse, the data speed (when necessary) is actually ok. If you pay any attention to the location (from I-43) its a lousy spot on the power line, substantially lower and further back then the towers sitting right up to 43 off the expressway. I often lose reception on a foggy day and go into roaming. The tower as it stands does not appear to be substantial enough to handle the larger antenna, so it will be interesting to see what has to be done to make that work. As I have stated in the past, my last contact regarding this tower was 2-3 months ago when the Town of Vernon confirmed with me that the final 4g tower upgrade plan was not even submitted to Waukesha County for approval yet. I will be checking back shortly with the town to see where Sprint is in that process and give an update. This may be one of those towers that will be handled when its handled.. To bad for me, but at least general southern Waukesha County is moving  at a much improved pace in the last 6 months.

There is further progress on the Muskego (south) tower, the guys are there today to finish the wiring of the antennas that were installed earlier this month. Usual story though, they are from down South and don't know towers by name or location. The guy in charge said very little and told me they bounce tower to tower wherever they are told to go. I asked him about my home tower in Big Bend/Vernon that is on top of high power lines and he said it would be a slow process as they get a very short window of time by the power company to do the work and it could still be months away. No one on the ground really knows anything except what they are supposed to be doing. I am quite sure we will be dragging well through the winter months before anything more (substantial) in 4g becomes of this market.

Follow up to this last post, the Muskego north Water tower site (Racine ave/ Industrial Park) is under full upgrade right now. Faith Technologies is there installing all the cabinets and the 4g antennas. He said they will be completing everything needed to be done minus Sprint coming in for the testing and activation. This probably has been going on a while as all the equipment is completely out of site in the bottom of the water tower and I would have not noticed it as I drove by in the past. He said the cabinets are all in and the 4g antenna is next. Within the next week or two, both Muskego towers should be ready to be turned on... not that they will, just that they CAN....

I've been out hunting the whole time man. It doesn't pay to take pictures anymore because most of the towers in my area have NV panels up already. So we're all waiting for an unseen delay at this point.

 

My tower on 92nd and Beloit has all of it's panels replaced. I see all the old panels are off and all new ones are up. Most of the panels have both RRU's sitting behind them, but there are a couple that only have one RRU behind them, and the ropes are still hanging from the rack, so I'm guessing they still have a couple to mount. After that, it should be ready to go. Fiber and new cabinet has been in place for a while now. 

 

I don't know what they're waiting for. The contractor I talked to said they turn on LTE in "clusters", but that doesn't seem to be the case for the Milwaukee area's existing LTE towers. So far the towers that are broadcasting LTE aren't in any kind of "cluster", they're kind of spread out. So I don't know if I really believe the cluster theory. I just can't wait to see some more action around here. It looks like literally every tower outside of the Milwaukee/Waukesha area has had at least one upgrade (3g, 800, or LTE). So they've essentially "worked their way in" and all that's left is the actual Milwaukee/Waukesha areas. 

There is further progress on the Muskego (south) tower, the guys are there today to finish the wiring of the antennas that were installed earlier this month. Usual story though, they are from down South and don't know towers by name or location. The guy in charge said very little and told me they bounce tower to tower wherever they are told to go. I asked him about my home tower in Big Bend/Vernon that is on top of high power lines and he said it would be a slow process as they get a very short window of time by the power company to do the work and it could still be months away. No one on the ground really knows anything except what they are supposed to be doing. I am quite sure we will be dragging well through the winter months before anything more (substantial) in 4g becomes of this market.

I'm not sure why it's hilarious. I know we tiptoe around it here, but Sprints service up until now has been subpar. You make it seem like his opinion is unfounded. I wouldn't be here if I didn't expect (hope) it will improve, but come on now, for most I the recent past, this guy has been right.

You would be missing my point then, they were installing equipment for sprint and saying it sucked.. that is humorous...(and ironic) I was not dismissing his opinion, but it was amusing at the time and situation.  I have been one of the lucky ones who, although disgusted with the lack of 4g service, I have had reasonably useful service in this southern Waukesha area and I have been carrying SERO my entire time with Sprint. It has saved me a tremendous amount of money over time, but in the end you get what you pay for.  I will fully admit, as I have said here before, that if my service area was below HWY 100 I would have been out a long time ago. Either way it is what it is and things are moving forward. So lets celebrate these baby steps as we always have had to do with this carrier.  

I did talk to an AT&T fiber guy who was at the radio station tower near 124th and Beloit. He said AT&T had around 50 or so sites in the area that they needed to run fiber to. That was like 2 months ago, and from the way he talked, it seemed like they were on the ball getting those done. He said that most of the Waukesha sites were already done at that point. So I don't think it's backhaul that's holding all these up. I've also noticed the 92nd and beloit tower has fiber and new cabinets too. So I'm really expecting to see like 10-15 sites go live with LTE in the Milwaukee/Waukesha area one of these days. I pretty much live and work in that big gap of no LTE around Milwaukee/Waukesha :/ so no LTE for me on a regular basis yet.

Regarding Waukesha....As an update to my earlier post.. I checked back Friday with the Eastern Muskego tower on College Ave and I incorrectly assumed the 2 guys were doing ground (cage) work. They actually were assembling the 4g antenna and had the wires ready to lift. In the brief time I spoke to them, they were either pretending to be clueless to any other work to be done or they really didn't know. I am going with the don't know because they were both from down South and did not really know where anything was here. I asked them about the Vernon tower on 164 in Big Bend and they looked at me like I was asking about  Alaska... The only hardly useful information I was given was they were heading to another tower in the area to do more antenna install (would not tell me where) and then they were going back to Madison for 2 more. They were very nice guys, but had there own opinion about Sprint ... hilariously the one said .. Sprint Sucks,, I think they are on the bottom of all the carriers we have worked with... too funny although they really do not work for Sprint I guess. I just thought it was somewhat ironic. I also commented about how long some of the towers with NV have been sitting around non-operational (Calhoun in New Berlin comes to mind) and he said you should expect a 6 month window from the time its up to the time its running. I think that probably is just guessing on his part, but sadly there may be some truth in it..

Either way I am just glad to see some NV equipment up on the south side of Waukesha County, its a start... Impressive to see the NV antenna on the ground, They really look HUGE...

ENCOURAGING.... I drove past the Muskego tower on College and Tess Corners drive and Sprint NV was in full install mode. There was a non-distinct work truck and the guys were in the cage installing all the Samsung Sprint NV ground equipment. I drove back to see if I could get some info and one of them came out to the truck. I asked him if they were installing the 4g antenna soon and he said "In the next couple of days".

I know we have several sites now on this side of town (New Berlin etc)  that have NV up but are not transmitting, my hope is this will be one they light up quickly. I drive past this site every weekday so I will keep you updated.

I wished I could have picked the guys brain for additional tower work in the area, but he was barely interested in talking to me, so I left it as is.

I also am wondering if anyone knows this??? Pieper Power has been in the Muskego Sprint Water Tower off of Janesville road for days now, they do industrial Electrical contracting in WI. I noticed today they had a hatch open up top by the Antenna. Is It possible they may be involved in the 4g work for wiring? I tried twice to find someone to talk to, but they were all up top so I did not stop.

I picked up LTE on National Ave right by Culvers today in New Berlin.  Didn't get a chance to use it once I noticed it though since I drove out of the LTE signal pretty quickly (which unfortunately seems to be the case for Sprint service in general in this area).

Interesting... 3 possible towers involved and I would say it's most likely the Calhoun and Cleveland Tower. I think I confirmed with another poster last month that Calhoun has NV equipment up. Its possible though  unlikely that it could have been the water tower on I-43 and Mooreland and very highly unlikely that it would have been the National and Racine Ave Tower. I believe that tower has NV on it too. Oddly I drove by the Water Tower on I-43/ Mooreland yesterday getting on the freeway and I noticed trucks working down below at the base. Hopefully this is work for Sprint. I guess it Sloooowly keeps creeping south west towards me, but this is good news. I will head that way tomorrow and try to track this too...

I drove past the Cleveland & Calhoun water tower this morning, and from what I can tell, it does look like NV equipment on the top of the water tower. I'm not 100% sure, but I saw RRU's mounted behind what looked like Sprint's NV panels... I've seen this alot over the past few weeks. There must be a boatload of sites that are almost ready, but waiting for one piece or another to be finished...   :/

That's what I suspected, it did seem to look far different then I had remembered it in the early part of the year. Do you or any of the other forum watchers on this side of town have the ability to drive by the National Ave tower in New Berlin. Its right above Racine Ave about 2 blocks west on National. It the middle of the 3 towers on that hill and is buried in the trees right close to National. It looks like to me that NV equipment is on the lower part of the tower, but I am unable to get a decent picture due to its location. This tower is shorter and stuffed full of antenna (possibly) from several providers. Thanks in advance..

TIme Warner Business trucks working at the Muskego tower on College near Janesville..  Wishful thinking I guess....

I frequently drive by the tower at Cleveland & Calhoun, but I'm not really sure if Sprint's equipment is on the water tower itself or the cell tower right next to it.... In the sponsor maps, I've found 1 or 2 cell sites that weren't plotted exactly on the cell tower, but were within 30-40 yards of it. So when it comes to a site where there is more than 1 cell tower right next to each other, I'm not 100% certain which one is Sprint's. I'll drive past it again on my way home today and I'll pay extra attention. Last time I looked, I didn't think that I saw Sprint NV panels up there, but I'll look again.

I am pretty sure Sprint is sitting on the water tower now (or will be). A letter to the City on May 21st of this year spells out Sprints plan to relocate and upgrade the Antenna on a temporary pole to the water Tower. This is part of the letter...

Swap out of obsolete electronics cabinets, antennas and other equipment at the site. This will include relocation of the existing antennas from the temporary wooden pole to the water tank per the attached construction drawings. Landlord's acknowledgement of notice and consent will not increase the size or amount of space being used by Tenant under the Site Agreement unless specifically stated above.

Is there anyone that is able to confirm NV equipment on the water tower in New Berlin by Calhoun and Cleveland? I drove by it with my family in the car on Sunday and was unable to pay close enough attention to it. I have not been in the area for over 2 months and rarely drive by it anymore. It looks different to me and studying the pictures on these forums I thought it may be NV. Anyone??

As for anything else I have been watching, no activity in Muskego or Big Bend/Vernon, or other New Berlin sites. The one on National above Racine Ave is hard to see because of the tree cover. It loaded with antenna from too many different companies for me to tell.

I had a good feeling about today and I was expecting to wake up to amazing news.  Not so much. 

Man, it's been pretty quiet in the Milwaukee market the past 2-3 weeks. I'm really hoping to see an update with like 6-7 accepted LTE sites in the Milwaukee area. I think we're about due!

I did a little more snooping into the Vernon/ Big Bend tower near my home since the 6 months have past since Vernon granted Sprints request for the upgrade. Town Planner called me back to say that Sprint has not even cleared the permits with Waukesha County that are needed and this initial request was approved in February of 2013. Looks like this tower will be slow to come up. I am assuming that a County like Waukesha is one of the less painful places to get the permits approved, but this sounds like a holdup on Sprints part right now... Bummer....

That tower looks exactly like the one by me in Sussex.  I was thinking the top two racks were VZW (thin panels might be EV-DO, panels in the middle top rack might be 1X, middle rack might have 1X and LTE for VZW).  The middle rack was put up there 2-3 years ago when VZW was deploying LTE.  I think Sprint is on the bottom.  I could be totally wrong though... just a guess.  The tower by me is owned by Verizon, so I'd assume they would be on top

You are correct in that this is a Verizon owned tower, I found it on Antennasearch. I suppose that would likely mean Sprint has the bottom spot. I tried getting some inside info from a high up at Verizon in my area, but they informed me that was a separate department that would have to be notified of the work being started. So we wait....

Is it fair to say this site would likely not need additional fiber run to it since it is an existing Verizon tower? That would certainly make for an easier 4g conversion.

Took a drive past the Muskego (West College Ave) and took a shot or two. I will need someone else to make the call, but it did appear the NV equipment may be in the middle. This is a shared site so hopefully they have all the speed (Fiber) they need already there. I didn't bother trying for photos of the ground boxes as the site was covered fairly well with a fence covering. Thoughts?

Sorry. I wanted to just add photos, but this link to download was all I was able to do. I must be missing something.

^ What putterizer said. This site has all the existing Sprint cell sites plotted on a map, as well as all of the 4g and 3g upgraded sites plotted on a map. The upgraded sites map gets updated 1-3 times per week usually. It's really fun to see the progress. Also check out sensorly.com where you can actually see the signal strength that people have mapped out in our area. 

 

On a side-note, I think the Milwaukee area is going to be really picking up the pace very soon. I've seen ALOT of network vision panels on many different Sprint cell sites that haven't been marked complete yet... Here's a list of some places where I've seen the panels already mounted... (these are approximate locations)

 

22nd & Pierce (Milwaukee)

84th & Bluemound (West Allis?)

76th & Layton (Greenfield)

Forest Home & Hwy 100 (Hales Corners)

the water tower at UW Waukesha

Brookfield Square Mall (Saw work being done, not 100% sure if it's for Sprint)

 

I think there were a couple more, but these are the ones I remember for sure. So I'm hoping these will come online over the next week or 2.

Ok, I pulled the trigger and became a sponsor. Its a helpful map and I even found a tower or two that I didn't know were Sprint towers. Sadly this area of Southern Waukesha County I-43 does not appear to have any activity right now, but I hope it will be soon. If Hales Corners is getting ready, I would hope it would start moving out to Muskego next... 

Hello, I am new posting to this forum but have been watching it since the beginning of 4g rollout in southeast Wisconsin. I to have been promised for 4 years that it is coming.... really.... but am glad that it is finally showing up. I have a few observations and then a few questions if someone is kind enough to help. I live in the Muskego/Big Bend area so it looks like I may still be waiting a bit for anything to occur in these more rural area's. I am thankful that my 3g actually works well 98% of the time on this side of town. I have no idea how you Sprint users in the Milwaukee area survived this long. I have been down to many locations in the Milwaukee area over the last couple of years and really noticed how incredibly horrible service is (was) along with the totally unusable data to boot. I have to be honest and say that I would have switched a long time ago if it were not for the semi-reasonable 3g speeds I get in Waukesha County. That being said, I have been spending some time snooping around my community and looking at the municipalities in my area to try and figure out when we might actually see any service light up out here. Here is what I found (and this may have already been spoke of so sorry if it has) .... For my fellow Southern Waukesha suburbanites..

Vernon has a tower located on Cheri Drive (Big Bend, but Vernon proper) that has had a request in for changes since February for the replacement of half of the 3g towers for 4g along with the running of fiber to the site. Unless I am missing something, the site does not look like anything has been done yet. I reviewed some of the 4g antenna pictures on this site and I am quite certain the 3g is still in place. I think Vernon gave them 6 months to complete, but the Town said companies often come to them for a extension.

Muskego does not post permit requests online like some do, but they confirmed that Sprint requested Work in the beginning of the year for what I assume is the 4g upgrades. I did not bother to pick up copies of that paperwork as I assume it looks the same as the ones I found online for New Berlin and Vernon. I looked at the Muskego Water Tower in the industrial park off of Racine Ave today, and this time I am not quite certain if the upgrades have been done. It does not look the same as the Vernon tower, but I don't think I see everything that is necessary for the NV upgrades.

New Berlin had a similar request to Vernon for 3 towers to upgrade half of the data antennas to 4g in 3 locations. One on Calhoun at the Municipal Building, one further out West by Racine Ave, and I am forgetting the 3rd. I have not looked at these towers to confirm any work is or has been done.

I am hoping that my information is helpful, and would like to ask someone that has access to this sites deeper info, weather or not any of these sites mentioned are showing any progress in the 4g area. I would also be curious as to how many Sprint owned sites are actually in this area? Am I wrong to assume a majority of the site in these rural areas are 3rd party owned and Sprint uses them. I cannot find any good specific information about Sprint tower locations on this side of town. Most listed on the Antenna Database website are not showing Sprints name attached to them even though I know Sprint has a presence on them. I am also assuming that Sprint uses some of the towers in this area along with other carriers, but maybe I am incorrect about that too. Please feel free to lay any info you can on me, I am anxiously awaiting my phone to say 4g connected in my own home and tromping grounds in this general area. I had the 4g tease on the way home along  I-94 last week, and most recently the South Side of Waukesha along 164-59 and I have been amazed at times. Thanks for your time....