5G Service Is ‘Ubiquitous Throughout Roswell,’ Says Ga. City’s New RF Expert

T-Mobile has several “overarching objections” to the May 7 report in which Ben Levitan, the new RF expert hired by Roswell, Georgia, concluded it would be “overkill” for T-Mobile to build a 108-foot cell tower to remedy a significant wireless coverage gap (see 2405080002), said Levitan’s memorandum Monday (docket 1:10-cv-01464) in U.S. District Court for Northern Georgia. It said T-Mobile is unaware “of the source of the cell phone coverage maps” Levitan used in his report and analysis. “This is odd, because these maps are the simulation maps created by T-Mobile themselves and used in their application to show their gap in 4G cell service in Roswell, and the simulation of the improvement that their proposed cell tower will bring,” said the memorandum. These maps have been “the key” to T-Mobile’s argument for the new cell tower since the dispute began in 2010, it said. Contrary to T-Mobile's argument that the report fails to cite the source of these maps, the proper citations are in the report, but even without a citation, the maps “should have been easily recognizable to T-Mobile,” it said. Levitan’s report found that T-Mobile’s concerns about a lack of cellphone service to a specific 0.9-square-mile area of Roswell, and the inability for residents in that area to have 911 service, are “unfounded,” said the memorandum. Levitan also found that 5G service is "ubiquitous throughout Roswell," it said: “As new generations of the cell phone networks are designed, they fully incorporate the functionality of previous generations, and as such, any 3G, 4G or LTE phone operating in a 5G network will work fine. This backward compatibility means that there is no need to update the 4G coverage in the gap area as it is fully covered by 5G.” T-Mobile’s lawsuit against Roswell for the city's denial of its cell tower application turned 14 years old on Monday.