Open Signal Maps (for cell towers)

[Jim Hunt]

You can locate cell towers and such at http://opensignalmaps.com/

Currently an Android app available and an iPhone app coming. Might be useful for those looking for coverage by carrier. (No app needed just to look at results/maps.)

 

[John Erwin]

Thanks for this! Good for planning purposes or as a quick reference. Doesn't work well for my home location though; only shows one of the GSM providers in my area.

 

[Jason Foster]

For the central plains....the data set is way lacking. Nothing very accurate around my how location either. Probably a huge amount of towers missing from their database.

 

[Scott Weberpal]

This looks like it's from about 2004.

 

[Jim Hunt]

It seems fairly accurate here. The couple of new towers up in the past 12 months are on the map.

 

[Robert Rohloff]

Any idea on the average distance for a tower, speaking of the flat plains chase area?

 

[ScottKoenig]

Any idea on the average distance for a tower, speaking of the flat plains chase area?

Taken from Wikipedia

As a rough guide, based on a tall mast and flat terrain, it is possible to get between 50 to 70 km (30–45 miles). That being said from what I have been reading it's realistically around 20 miles.

The factor is really the ability of a low-powered personal cell phone to transmit back to the mast This makes me curious how many miles this can be extended with a Wireless Amplifier, that have much higher transmit power than a stand alone cell phone.

The maximum range of a mast (where it is not limited by interference with other masts nearby) depends on the same circumstances. Some technologies, such as GSM, normally have a fixed maximum range of 35 kilometres (22 mi), which is imposed by technical limitations. CDMA and iDEN have no built-in limit, but the limiting factor is really the ability of a low-powered personal cell phone to transmit back to the mast. As a rough guide, based on a tall mast and flat terrain, it is possible to get between 50 to 70 km (30–45 miles). When the terrain is hilly, the maximum distance can vary from as little as 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) to 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) due to encroachment of intermediate objects into the wide center fresnel zone of the signal. Depending on terrain and other circumstances, a GSM Tower can replace between 2 and 50 miles (80 km) of cabling for fixed wireless networks.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_site