>> Geeezzzz ,,,, I don' t think I ve seen such a negative spin on anything
in
>> my life ! Can the end of the world be far behind ?
>
> Apparently you've haven't applied for a building permit for a tower
>before. Reality strikes, dude.
>
>Cheers, Steve K7LXC
Depends on where you live, Steve. Here in Live-Free-or-Die country it took
about 15 minutes with the town zoning/building officer, $26 in fees, a
two-week waiting period (a notice was posted on the town bulletin board but
the abutters were not contacted), and no engineering specs were required. No
building inspector ever showed up to check it out. Not so when we remodeled
the house -- guess they think towers are too simple to worry about or they
don't feel confident in their ability to address the engineering issues.
This attitude is kind of surprising because it's a wealthy town, and they
tend to have more people who care about massive towers "ruining" property
values. But the zoning law was on my side. I had used the same law to get a
permit 10 years earlier (never used it) and other hams had used it as well
(e.g., 100' of Rohn 45 with stacked beams.) The key point is that the zoning
law eliminates *all* height restrictions for towers in private use. I think
some satellite dish owner pushed that through 15 years ago when he needed to
get his dish above some trees. Probably a member of the town council. I was
amazed that there is explicitly NO HEIGHT LIMIT as long as you stay within
the defined setbacks (50'). Most people around here have big lots, so the
setback restriction just affects the downtown dwellers. I remember the first
time I applied for a permit, the building/zoning officer (different guy)
said, "Oh, yeah -- the Fire Chief is a ham. He has one of those." That
turned out to be a TH6DXX on a 40' hand-cranked U.S. Tower tubular bracketed
to a tiny house in a crowded neighborhood. The tower was cranked down 99% of
the time, but the beam was bigger than the roof of his house. His house
looked like an ugly helicopter!
There's a loophole, though: the law says, "no height restriction for towers
used for private reception of radio and TV signals." I did explain ham radio
to the zoning/building officer, especially the strict prohibition on
commercial activity, but apparently he didn't pick up on the subtle
distinction. Just in case, I had a lawyer look into it and she said there
could be some exposure if neighbors later sued. Guess I could always claim
that it's a very expensive SWL antenna. They'd have to catch me
transmitting. Luckily, the tower is hidden so that even I can't see it when
it's cranked below 60 feet, and the neighbors can't see it when fully
cranked up to 70'. It's a 1/4 mile minimum from the nearest neighbor (she's
not home much of the year) and there are tons of tall trees in between. The
tower is too far away from houses and electric lines to cause RFI. It would
be tough for them to prove any damage or suffering in a lawsuit.
I know -- it's not the usual case for you folks in the big city, but doesn't
it make you want to consider the rural life? We have lots of retirees, so
start planning now for your retirement. In the smaller towns around here,
they'd look at you like you were crazy if you actually thought you needed
their permission to build a radio tower on your own property: "It's your
place, right? If you want to put a tower on it, that's your business." Even
so, I didn't consult with the neighbors about mine. I'd prefer that they
don't know it's there (you know the drill -- once they know about it, every
glitch in consumer electronics for a mile will be blamed on my tower.) I did
ask a neighbor to confirm the property line before I cleared some forest for
my 4-square, and told him what it was for, but his house is 1500 feet away
through the woods and he didn't seem to care about anything but where I
piled the wood chips (fire laws say 25 feet or more from the property line.)
Apparently, this ham-friendly attitude doesn't prevail when you get closer
to southern NH where the population in denser (did I mean that both ways?) I
guess the more neighbors you have and the closer they are, the less freedom
you have.
73, Dick, WC1M
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