[TowerTalk] Zoning approval

[Jeffrey R Davis]

>I am seeking to get zoning approval/building permits for erecting a
>self-supporting tower.  Is there a site or a reference that someone can
>point me to so that I can study up for this?

Hi Dave,

I recently went through this and can tell you what I did, which resulted in
a permit received within 2 weeks, no issues raised. I had heard all kinds
of horror stories from the local hams, including one who had a building
permit still hung up after 9 months!

Before I ever spent a nickel on a tower or antenna, I first made a trip to
the Zoning and Planning office, and just inquired about the permits
required and the paper necessary. I talked to people from both the zoning
commission and the building commission, basically trying to find out what
their issues & hot points were. In my area, the issues were essentially
that these folks don't know anything about towers and they don't want one
falling down and killing someone. Secondarily, if it does fall, it should
stay on my property! The folks at the office were, to my initial surprise,
very helpful and answered all my questions.

Then I went away and drew up the plans to install a 72' Trylon Titan, rated
by Trylon at 22 sq ft at 85 mph. The problem with Trylon is that there's
essentially no engineering data available to back their rating up and they
won't provide it if asked. In other words, there's no way you'll get
anything like an EIA/TIA-222 certification from them. Furthermore, I didn't
want to pay a PE to come up with the specs, nor establish a precedent that
you needed one to get a ham tower approved. So I was really concerned about
the acceptability to the building department, even though from the Tower
Talk archives I was pretty convinced that the tower was sound, if perhaps
aggressively specified.

I tried to do a neat job of a site plan with a computer drawing package,
showing all the features they requested. I even put a dotted circle
labelled "maximum fall radius" on the drawing for their reference. It was
not coincidental that the house, power lines, and property lines were all
outside that radius. I built up a brief spreadsheet showing how the
antennas planned for the tower would not exceed the manufacturer's specs in
an 80 mph wind (the Basic Wind Speed for Linn County, Iowa). In fact, I was
a little conservative, showing that I had less than the max area specified
at 85 mph, which is what the manufacturer rated the tower for. [You might
want to take a look at a nice article by Stu Bonney in the latest QEX,
which covers wind loading calculations in detail. It sure helped me.]

I had determined that the primary areas of ambiguity were at the Building
Commission, as the acceptance criteria at Zoning were very clear and I fit
well within them. So I made an appointment with the chief building
inspector to discuss my plans personally. I brought with me a copy of the
property plat, my site plan, printouts from the spreadsheets, the
foundation and assembly drawings from Trylon, and a Trylon advertising
brochure. When we met, I concentrated on (1) establishing personal
credibility as someone who had thought through the issues and was concerned
about safety, and (2) helping him understand why the tower as proposed was
safe, in that it would be installed per the manufacturer's specs and loaded
within their rated maximums.

Two weeks later, I had the permit!! It had been personally approved by the
chief building inspector, which was something of a surprise that he hadn't
delegated it to someone on his staff.

Sorry to be so lengthy. Hope this helps.

73,

Jeff - N0DY

P.S. Poured 9 yards of concrete last Wednesday!!!





David Leikis <dlleikis@deseretonline.com> on 04/11/99 11:32:45 PM

Please respond to dlleikis@deseretonline.com

To:   towertalk <towertalk@contesting.com>
cc:
Subject:  [TowerTalk] Zoning approval





Hello,

I am seeking to get zoning approval/building permits for erecting a
self-supporting tower.  Is there a site or a reference that someone can
point me to so that I can study up for this?

I don't know if I may get a "fight" or not, but would like to also be
prepared in case I do.  I have read many stories of fights, some won and
some lost, but need to know what my "real rights" may be.  Direct
references to Utah or federal law, if applicable, would be helpful.

Thanks in advance,

Dave KG7EW


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FAQ on WWW:               http://www.contesting.com/towertalkfaq.html
Submissions:              towertalk@contesting.com
Administrative requests:  towertalk-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems:                 owner-towertalk@contesting.com
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