Kootenay cell service

[Rampage_Rick]

It's about that time of year where myself and family members will be trekking all around the southeast of the province for the holidays.  Thanksgiving is only a week away, followed by ski trips, birthdays, Christmas, etc.  I was wondering about the status of some of the new cell towers in the area.

First and foremost:  Nelson to Cranbrook

I know that there are two new towers at Cottonwood Lake and Ymir, but they were not yet active when I passed through in late July.  Are these operational yet?  Anything else along the Salmo-Creston?

Second:  Revelstoke to Nelson

Now I understand that the Winlaw-Slocan tribe is vehemently opposed to towers, but surely there must be more coverage planned in addition to the service in Nakusp and Silverton/New Denver.  There's a big knob right above Shelter Bay that's just begging for a tower to beam service from Revelstoke to Nakusp.  Any new service along Highway 23 or Highway 6?

Lastly:  Christina Lake to Castlegar

Early last year I remember reading about new towers planned for the Blueberry-Paulson with a timeline of 1-2 years.  Any word on these?

Once you factor in all the smartphones and Ipads and Onstar-equipped vehicles I'd wager there are more devices than people travelling in our family this year.  It's nice to have the peace of mind while driving in winter, especially in some of those remote areas.

[wally_west]

Greetings, my advice would be for you to do a Google search with the names of the roads in your area. You can also look at the map here http://www.telus.com/en/bc/mobility/network/coverage-map.jsp?INTCMP=NETWORKcoveragemap which can also give you an idea. When I have to travel up north, I know some areas won't have service and I remember that few years ago, no one had cell phones and we were still able to travel far 🙂

Also, I'm not sure if I want to see a giant cell tower in some of these places, the nature is so beautiful outside the city.

I'm not sure that you'll find the exact answer here and if you don't, feel free to contact their tech support team.

Cheers!

[Rampage_Rick]

Thanks both of you.  I did look through those but didn't really find a concrete answer.  Telus' coverage map is fairly comprehensive, though a bit out of date.  It doesn't show the new coverage between Princeton and Hedley that went live about 3 months ago, and it doesn't show any current or future coverage between Nelson and Salmo, and those towers have been standing since the beginning of summer.  (I heard that the delay is partly due to the 2013 FortisBC Lockout causing a backlog for powerline construction)  Guess I'll find out the status this weekend...

The Connecting BC new coverage map is even older, as most of that was live in 2012.  While sleuthing I did find a heap of land use approvals over at the ARFD site, so it looks like the tower crews will be busy next year as well.

[NFtoBC]

Interesting.We spent two days at Old Hedley Road campsite without coverage in September. Must still be some dead spots.

[NFtoBC]

The publicly available information is here. The enthusiast websites iPhone in Canada, and Mobile Syrup also report news announcements on this topic.

[nasty]

Canadian cell towers map. Link focused on Telus towers and  Princeton/Hedley

http://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html?lat=49.379176&lng=-120.157423&zoom=11&type=road...

How data is generated for the map

http://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites-howitsdone.html

[NFtoBC]

@nasty 

I can confirm there's an active cell tower in bustling downtown Hedley at the Telus exchange, but it is not indicated on this map yet. Seems there is often a considerable delay between when the towers a lit, and the database used in this map get updated. We have one near my town which was active for about 4 months before it showed on the map.

[Rampage_Rick]

I was bored so I compiled a bunch of land use applications from various government sites. (ALC, ARFD, CSRD, etc)  Also included recent towers from Telus press releases.

http://www3.telus.net/rampage/Telus%20Proposed%20Towers.kmz

[NFtoBC]

@Rampage_Rick   Thanks for this effort. The points you marked fill a lot of gaps.

[Rampage_Rick]

Update:

The tower near Ymir is live.  There is now coverage all the way from Salmo through Hall Siding.

The tower near Cottonwood Lake isn't yet operational.  Looks like it's finished and has power, however they still need to tap into the fiber along the highway and run it to the tower (about 4-5 poles)

Also saw a new 70-meter-plus tower near Bridesville, but no new coverage yet.