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Fall 2002 Issue |
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 A pair of 2000-foot commercial tower near Raleigh, North Carolina. Many ham radio repeaters are getting a free ride, or at least a very reduced rate, to the top of towers such as this one. |
FM Look! Up in the Sky! It’s . . . By Gary Pearce, KN4AQ |
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Oops. No they’re not. The class is shared by broadcast radio and TV stations, commercial two-way companies, paging systems, cellular providers—outfits with the need and the finances to get their antennas up high and have them stay there. Amateur radio repeaters have the need, too. The finances? One casual rule of thumb for calculating the value of extreme vertical real estate is one dollar per foot per month, which is obviously going to vary, depending upon just what that air is hovering over. New York City is more expensive than Lizard Lick, North Carolina. What ham group can afford any variation of a formula that would have them shelling out hundreds of dollars per month for an antenna mount, just so you can complain about traffic on the commute to work? No, most ham repeaters are getting a free ride to the top, or at least a very reduced rate. Eric Meth, VE3EI, says that the company he worked for put amateur radio repeaters in the class of “technical charity.” Indeed. Most amateur repeater owners pay less than $100 per year for space that is just as good and just as high as that of their commercial neighbors who are paying full freight. Nice work if you can get it, but getting it is becoming more difficult. Actually, responses to my request for repeater-site success and failure stories in this past summer’s column were more positive overall than I had expected. There are thousands of amateur repeaters operating across the U.S. and Canada, and most of them are doing fine. I did hear a few horror stories, though, which I will relate in a minute. Space for Next to Nothing Just how do hams wangle this valuable space for next to nothing? If you think it is amateur radio’s commitment to emergency communications and public service, you’re not wrong, but you’re in second place. I guess it’s not too surprising that personal contacts—the right ham in the right place—top the list. You’ll find hams working for most every company that can grant access to antenna sites. They are technicians, chief engineers, and even owners. Although no one confessed to it, I’m sure that there is more than one repeater out there operating on the sly with a midnight connection to an orphan antenna. Mostly, the hams are able to convince their bosses that an amateur radio repeater is a good thing to have. Then public service comes into play to seal the deal. Public-service claims by themselves don’t seem to get repeaters a foot off the ground.
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