Tilson’s customer, a major wireless communication service provider, needed to quickly add capacity to its network coverage in Lexington, Kentucky. Tilson worked through regulatory, construction, and COVID-19 related challenges to place and maintain over 35 poles with nearly 80 more to come.
Obtaining regulatory approval in Lexington has historically been difficult and often takes six or more months to complete. Regulatory challenges were accompanied by other logistical challenges including placing new poles along major highways. Sourcing pole locations required balancing our customer’s capacity to lay fiber underground with the utility company’s ability to bring power to the poles. Adding an additional layer of complexity to the project, the city of Lexington required the replacement of utility-owned streetlights so that they would aesthetically match the new poles.
Tilson navigated the complex regulatory and compliance environment with all the stakeholders required to replace a pole in the Right of Way (ROW), such as the municipal entities, tribal governments, and utility companies. Leveraging a depth of experience working in ROWs, Tilson sourced site locations, approved candidate sites, designed, permitted, and constructed poles in under four months – a pace significantly faster than the industry standard of 6 months or more. Tilson partnered with its asset owning affiliate, Tilson Infrastructure to oversee the replacement of the utility owned poles and long-term ownership and maintenance. A longstanding relationship with our vendor ensured timely equipment delivery and cost savings throughout the supply chain uncertainties of COVID-19.
Tilson enabled our customer to rapidly improve their wireless service in Lexington by bringing together stakeholders and leveraging existing relationships to reduce our customer’s time to market. Additionally, Tilson Infrastructure owns and continues to maintain the infrastructure, including the new luminaire arms it placed on behalf of the project.
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A major wireless communications provider