With Cities Raising Red Flags, Carr Says Infrastructure Reform Key to Leadership on 5G

“Since 2015, China has built 350,000 cellsites as part of its plan to densify networks for 5G,” Carr said. “Less than 30,000 were built in the U.S. over that same period. … We have to be honest about this; we have to recognize and address this infrastructure challenge.” Carr said that until recently, FCC rules started with the assumption that every deployment was a 200-foot tower. “That meant long and costly reviews,” he said. “That makes no sense when 80 percent of all new deployments are going to be small cells -- roughly backpack-sized antennas that can attach to existing utility poles.”

Indiana shows why infrastructure rule overhaul is critical, Carr said. Since state siting revisions were enacted last year, wireless providers have installed more than 1,000 small cells in more than 30 communities, he said. AT&T and Verizon (see 1808300057) single out Indianapolis “as a showcase city for 5G, with their next-gen networks going live by year’s end,” he said.

Carr cited Fishers, Indiana, where Mayor Scott Fadness (R) negotiated a provision in the state small-cell bill allowing cities to conduct reasonable aesthetic reviews. Carr said Fadness showed him the results the previous week: “Dozens of new small cells deployed on street lights to minimize their visual impact.” Similarly, in Texas, which also approved siting legislation, “major 5G investments have been announced in Austin, Dallas, Houston and Waco,” Carr said.

“Whatever degree fees are lowered by the federal government beyond Illinois law will only further make Illinois an attractive location for telecom investment,” a Rauner spokesperson said. The law exempted Chicago and said local governments could charge application fees of $350 per facility for a single application with multiple facilities -- or $650 for an application with one facility -- on an existing utility pole or wireless support structure. But the FCC’s draft order would limit application fees to $500 for a batch application with up to five wireless small cells, plus $100 for each additional facility on the application. The order may also lower rate ceilings in four other states with small-cells laws (see 1809110030).

“Illinois’ small cell bill significantly reduced red tape and government barriers blocking increased investment and expansion of 5G broadband in Illinois,” the spokesperson said. “The legislation went far beyond fees, streamlining standards for approval timelines, design specs, and zoning considerations.”

Local Concerns

More local governments opposed the Carr proposal.

In identically worded letters last week in docket 17-84, Virginia's Prince George County and multiple cities said they are “concerned that these preemption measures compromise” local governments’ “traditional authority and expose wireless infrastructure providers to unnecessary liability.” Proposed shot clocks are “too extreme,” the definition of “effective prohibition” is too broad and restricting annual fees to $270 per small-cellsite is unreasonable, said the county, a suburb of Washington.

Many states and communities were represented, from Casper, Wyoming, to Huntington Beach, California, and Manhattan, Kansas. A Washington, D.C., suburb, College Park, Maryland, said its council voted unanimously Sept. 11 to oppose the order. Mayors signed many of the letters. All Massachusetts municipalities have "grave concerns," said the Massachusetts Municipal Association.

The FCC draft failed to discuss a minority report filed by local governments on the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee working group on state and local barriers, said working group member Kevin Pagan, McAllen, Texas, city attorney. The working group didn't include the minority view in its report, but local governments separately filed it. "Fairness dictates that in the repeated references to the Barriers Working Group report, there should be at least a single note that there exists a Local Government Minority Report," Pagan said. "To the extent the commission cites BDAC materials, it should also acknowledge the dissenting views included in the BDAC’s record, particularly when referencing local government perspectives, which have been consistently minimized throughout the BDAC’s process and working group reports." McAllen is leading a lawsuit by 22 cities against the Texas small-cells law in state court (see 1709010054).

Mobilitie filed on a meeting last week with Carr, Commissioner Mike O’Rielly and aides to the other commissioners. It said the March infrastructure order (see 1803220027) helps it deploy by cutting red tape. “Because more than 85 percent of Mobilitie’s facilities qualify as small wireless facilities, that order has enabled the company to reduce the regulatory review period for each of its thousands of small cells from months to a day or two for sites that meet the definition,” Mobilitie said in docket 07-79. “The order has substantially reduced Mobilitie’s processing costs, since a single test replaces multiple processes.”

MWC Notebook

Jessica Rosenworcel became the first FCC commissioner, by her account, to discuss 6G, which she said will mean THz-frequency networks and spatial multiplexing. “If you’re thinking I’m too early on this one, consider this: a few months ago Google Trends rated the term 6G as the 17th most looked-up word in its search engine,” Rosenworcel said Thursday. “The Minister of Industry and Information Technology in China has already made the official pronouncement that the nation ‘will be first in 6G.’” A looming problem is how the U.S. government treats spectrum, scoring auctions and valuing licensed spectrum for the money it brings in to the Treasury, she said. “Over time, it will be especially challenging for unlicensed spectrum to make it through this filter." Unlicensed use "yields no funds in the scoring process even though we all know Wi-Fi adds billions to the broader economy,” the commissioner said. Rosenworcel wants the FCC to make more use of incentive auctions, including for the 2.5 GHz band. But she also said the regulator’s overall approach on auctions must change. “We need to commit to the idea that successful auctions have many bidders,” she said. “We need to consider how the size, duration, and set of rights that come with a license can increase the range of actors willing to participate in our auctions. We need to put a premium on auctioning multiple bands at once, rather than offering them to market piecemeal, one at a time.” Before 6G is the new industry buzzword, Rosenworcel said, the FCC needs to make dynamic spectrum sharing the “norm.” She expects many lessons to come from the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band once sharing starts there.

AM/FM radio remains a “potent force,” with $15 billion in annual advertising revenue, but in the future many more people will stream their music than get it over the air, Pandora CEO Roger Lynch said in a Friday keynote. Pandora is the third-most popular app. “The big change” to come is terrestrial radio, with advertising shifting to streaming services, he said. Radio listeners hear 15-20 minutes of ads each hour, versus four minutes on Pandora, Lynch said. “Yet those four minutes are quite valuable because of the targeting capabilities.”

Dominique Delport, president-international of Vice Media, noted that for the first time Apple is pricing its new iPhones (see 1809140042 or 1809140030) at a higher price point than iMacs, its desktop computers. “Mobile is the first screen,” Delport said. “Facebook is a mobile company, with 92 percent of their revenue linked to mobile advertising. The shift happened.” Mobile is “the way we share our news, our lifestyle,” Delport said: “Social media is media” for younger people. Vice, with its young audience, wants authenticity, he said. “We go deep, we spend months and we take the time that is needed,” he said. “That generation, they just don’t want to hear what to think. They want the facts. They have been empowered by mobile and social media. They know exactly how to curate their own information.”