L.A. to Get 2nd Cellular System by End of Year
Freeway-fixated Southern California, home of the nation’s most popular and crowded cellular mobile telephone system, should be getting its second system by the end of the year.
Los Angeles Cellular Telephone Co., which won the right to operate the region’s second franchise nearly 18 months ago, cleared its final pre-construction review from the state Public Utilities Commission last week. Company officials said they expect to begin building the $40-million system later this month, with completion scheduled by December.
The new system will come none too soon for thousands of car telephone users who have complained in recent months that the region’s original cellular system is far too crowded to handle the needs of its nearly 60,000 subscribers.
The existing system, started by the PacTel Mobile Access unit of Pacific Telesis in June, 1984, has more than twice the number of subscribers that it originally estimated it would have. The region, a 7,000-square-mile territory that includes Los Angeles and Orange counties and the western portions of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, contains about 25% of the cellular telephone users in the nation.
Will Double Capacity
Although PacTel has expanded its system several times in the last two years, the service is so popular that callers at peak commute hours still are frequently forced to wait to make their calls. The problems have been particularly acute in affluent, status-conscious communities in western Los Angeles County and southern Orange County.
With the start-up of the new system, the region’s cellular phone capacity will nearly double. PacTel operates 38 transmission sites, with two more scheduled to open later this month. Los Angeles Cellular plans to begin service with 38 transmission towers.
Los Angeles Cellular officials said they hope to overcome PacTel’s head start by using only the latest, state-of-the-art cellular technology, an area that has seen significant advances in the last several years.
“By coming in so late, we have an advantage because we know the system better,” said Hope Neiman, Los Angeles Cellular’s director of marketing. “We know where the dead spots are, and we can work around them.”
Although Los Angeles Cellular also could attempt to woo customers by undercutting PacTel’s prices, Neiman said she doubted that the company would follow that strategy. “We have a $40-million investment to recoup,” she said.
