Cox Communications® Seeks to Upgrade Cellular Signals in Macon Bibb

One of the high-speed internet providers, Cox Communications^® plans to install transmitters in select locations where small cells are situated in Macon Bibb County. The device would provide improved signals to cell phones or other devices at a 300 feet radius to up to 1000 feet. They are ideally installed in places where cellular signals or internet speeds are on the lower side with a high number of people using such services.

The shopping malls, busy road intersections, and colleges are ideal places to install such devices, says the director of business development of Cox Communications^®, Eric Berry. The transmitter devices can be affixed to existing street light poles in traffic signals or to a new pole.

“Sometimes you have a garbled voice,” Berry said. “If your kids are in a car, grandkids are in a car and playing video games and go, ‘oh, my phone doesn’t work,’ this is because the service got weak. The small cell will get you that consistent experience throughout the network.”

Cox Communications^® is now seeking a pact with Macon Bibb County to install the transmitters. If the agreement goes through, the county in Georgia could potentially get $700 to $1000 annual fees per streetlight having placed smart cells, Eric Berry said in a presentation given to the county commissioners.

Cox^® is partnering with select wireless carriers to deploy an infrastructure and to install transmitters, which would provide better signals to support broadband and other cellular services. The small cell deployment is an effort by carriers like Verizon^® Wireless to upgrade 5G internet capabilities.

“You have to have small cells in a very pinpoint location,” Berry said in the presentation. “That’s why streetlights, traffic signals or self-built 35-foot poles work the best. Cox’s preference is not to necessarily run around and put poles everywhere.”

In the past, there was an unfavorable response from occupants and businesses in Ingleside Avenue region when a telecommunications infrastructure company sought out to erect a new pole in order to improve broadband deployment capabilities. Yet recently, Macon Bibb Commissioner Mallory Jones said that the proposal put forth by Cox Communications^® seems to be a less cumbersome method to upgrade bandwidth.

“The small cell tower sounds interesting because it’s not going to mess up the landscape or the looks,” Jones said. “It looks like it’s more appealing.”