“Experts: New courthouse's poor cell reception no shock” |
| Experts: New courthouse's poor cell reception no shock Posted: 02 Feb 2011 02:44 AM PST It might seem that cell-phone signals would travel better through glass than through a wall. But building experts say Franklin County and its contractors should have known that isn't true with the type of energy-efficient glass that covers the new $105 million courthouse. Some say architects should have planned for the issue from the start. County officials announced Friday that the courthouse's opening would be delayed indefinitely because of reception problems for cell phones and police radios inside the building. But at least part of the project team has known about the problems for more than a year, according to records The Dispatch obtained this week. In November 2009, Sprint submitted a sales pitch to improve reception, calling coverage in the courthouse "poor." However, top county officials were unaware of the scope of the problems until December, Administrator Don Brown said. Energy-efficient glass often includes a transparent metal coating that filters out harmful rays and traps heat, and this coating might be contributing to the poor reception . Metal beams, concrete walls and metal shade canopies also might be part of the problem. The more buildings are insulated from the elements, the harder it is to send or receive a signal. Bids to fix the problem - the county plans to buy repeaters to boost signals - are expected to be ready for the commissioners' approval in two weeks. Installation could start a week later. County officials have estimated it could cost roughly $200,000 and delay the opening of the courthouse until April. Officials had planned to move in Presidents Day weekend, Feb. 19-21. Brown said the county won't investigate who is at fault and whether taxpayers will have to pay the bill until after the problem has been fixed. He said the courthouse is still on track to be under budget. Within the next week, the county will retest the signal strength to get a better idea of where the problem is most pronounced and why, Brown said. A test in October identified areas with no or poor reception, such as the basement, a tunnel and prisoner holding cells. Commissioner Paula Brooks said the building team has anticipated the need to boost reception for quite some time, and the issue had been placed on the back burner while the rest of the project was finished. "You always have something like this at the end of a project," she said. "You have to look at it holistically. We're going to have a near-perfect building that saves us millions in energy costs." But an e-mail sent last month to county officials suggests the communication problem had not been addressed well, particularly the question of the windows. "It is somewhat surprising to us that the green experts on the design team, particularly their telecom designers, did not convey this issue to the county at an early stage in the design so that we could plan accordingly," wrote Donald Wheat, a representative of Pizzuti Solutions, the general contractor. James A. Goodenow, the county's director of Public Facilities Management, wrote a reply to Wheat, who is accredited by the U.S. Green Building Council: "I can think of at least one party in addition to the design team that maybe should have been familiar with the issue." The glass in the new courthouse was supplied by Minnesota-based Viracon. Company spokeswoman Christine Shaffer said it's common knowledge that there is a tradeoff between reception and how "green" a pane of glass is. But energy-efficient glass alone shouldn't create problems, said Nadav Malin, president of BuildingGreen, a national company that provides independent information on the green building industry. He said government agencies sometimes run into reception problems because they prefer reinforced, blast-proof glass for safety. Brown said it's too early for people to be speculating about the source of the interference. He said no matter when the problem was detected, money would have had to be spent to correct it. He said the downside is the delay, not the money. But retrofitting means cutting through walls instead of building around a system installed from the beginning. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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