Anyone know what the huge tower is off of HWY 330?

[brianhos]

There is a large communication tower Northwest of Ames on Highway 17 that used to be the main communication link between North, South, East, and West for the US. It was literally the main link in communication for the country. Even more amazing is there is a large underground bunker directly under it in case of nuclear attack. It contained essential communications for the US as well as a hospital, barracks, and other facilities. If you look on the Northeast side of the hill underneath it you can see an entrance hidden behind rocks.

They actually turned that bunker into a datacenter: http://www.infobunker.com/

 

[00clone]

This is the one by Farley? I've never noticed that before, in nearly 30 years of living in Dubuque County. Interesting. Will have to look next time I drive past.

Yep, although you might have missed it if you focused on the town...it's south of the highway. So as you're going by the racetrack driving eastbound, look to the south, it sits on top of a little hill. The road coming out of Farley that goes over highway 20, but doesn't have an exit...that's the road that tower is on. Not more than .1 mile south of that bridge over highway 20....how you could miss it for 30 years, I don't know...but I could see it for a while if you only ever looked at toward town.

 

[jbhtexas]

Below is a link to the AT&T microwave network circa 1960. There were lines for TV+Voice, TV only, and Voice only. AT&T carried the 3 TV networks (NBC, ABC, CBS). Yes, for you youngsters out there, we had to suffer with only three TV networks and an independent station here and there...

Another interesting thing from the map legend is "off-the air pickup" for TV lines. Microwave transmission has a few interesting quirks, such as it has to be virtually line-of-sight, particular requirements for the terrain aound the tower, etc. Given those quirks and cost of the TV microwave repeater stations, it sometimes was not feasible to construct towers where needed to maintain the microwave link. Those areas were bridged using the broadcast from an actual TV station.

I remember back around 1970, out in South Central ND, for NBC we watched KFYR from Bismarck. But the link from Fargo to Valley City was "off-the-air", so we were actually watching not the raw network feed, but the broadcast from WDAY (who was NBC at the time) in Fargo. As such, we would get all the severe weather break-ins for eastern ND and western MN. Interesting, but kind of annoying. Satellite came along in the mid 1970's, and that issue was gone...



http://www.engineeringradio.us/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/MW6003.jpg

 

[CysRage]

Now I really wish I saw what c.y.c.l.o.n.e.s posted before he took it down!

 

[chuckd4735]

More interesting tower facts. Did you know the TV towers south of Alleman are tied for the 5th tallest structures in America?

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

 

[azepp]

More interesting tower facts. Did you know the TV towers south of Alleman are tied for the 5th tallest structures in America?

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

I don't count the oil rig, so I'd call it 4th.

 

[00clone]

More interesting tower facts. Did you know the TV towers south of Alleman are tied for the 5th tallest structures in America?

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

I'm wondering if there's something specific about 2000 ft (609.6 Meters is 2000')...look at the list of towers right around 609M, it's the whole page, pretty much.

 

[aeroclone08]

I'm wondering if there's something specific about 2000 ft (609.6 Meters is 2000')...look at the list of towers right around 609M, it's the whole page, pretty much.

This was in the Wikipedia page on the tallest tower on that list - the KVLY mast. I didn't check the source, but makes sense for where the 2000' limit may come from:

"Its height above mean sea level is 3,038 ft (926 m). Some time after its completion, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) imposed a policy that states, "Although there is no absolute height limit for antenna towers, both agencies have established a rebuttable presumption against structures over 2,000 feet above ground level."[5] The FCC and FAA may approve a taller structure in "exceptional cases."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KVLY-TV_mast

 

[kingcy]

A pain in the *** to spray around.

I think it is still used for something well it was 5 years ago. I remember there being workers there at different times when on that farm.

 

[khardbored]

I was travelling for work a few years ago and stopped in Chelsea, IA (where one of the other towers on the long-lines route is located). I asked a guy at a gas station what the big concrete tower was, he said, (imagine your best hick voice) "I dunno, but Grandpa said there used to be a time back when you couldn't have a conversation here in this town without the gov'ment knowin' about it!!!"

(I don't think his Grandpa was too accurate ... :wideeyed: )

 

[khardbored]

The tower in the OP (the "Collins" tower) was the last stop in the microwave relay line from Chicago to Des Moines. It accepted the signal from the east and beamed it into downtown Des Moines. I'm not 100% sure, but I think the accepting tower in DSM is the one that's right downtown, the old phone company building (now CenturyLink) is kind of been built "around" it.... not too far from 801 Grand. (looks kind of like this

If you watched network TV in the 50's, 60's, 70's and possibly even into the early 80's you owe a debt of gratitude to this network of towers!

I wonder if there were ever any classic Cyclone football/basketball games from that era that were broadcast on ABC/CBS/NBC nationally or at least regionally. If so, I bet the signal traveled right through this tower.

 

[jbhtexas]

Back in 1961, a guy by the name of Bernard Brous (and an accomplis) bombed two microwave towers and a cable repeater site. He made a pretty big mess, but AT&T recovered pretty quickly from the sound of it.

Early Sunday morning, May 28th, the TD-2 repeater stations at Cedar Mountain, Utah and Wendover, Nevada and the K carrier repeater station at Knolls, Utah were blown up and virtually destroyed, severing both the central transcontinental microwave and K carrier routes. Cedar Mountain is the second and Wendover the first TD-2 repeater station west of Salt Lake City. More than 2200 telephone and telegraph circuits and two television channels were interrupted.

Many private line circuits were made good within a short time and the first TD-2 systems were rerouted around the damaged section by way of Los Angeles within two hours. By Sunday evening, most of the circuits had been rerouted spare facilities and protection radio channels. One TD-2 channel was made available between Salt Lake City Junction and Los Angeles (via Turquoise) Tuesday night, May 30th, by expediting installation of new equipment on which work was nearing completion. This released some protection channels that had been used for reroutes.

"The Towers were not just blown over, a charge was set on each of the tower legs about a third of the way up, and detonated at exactly the same instant. The result was the lower part of the legs spread open and let the upper part of the tower drop straight down inside the bottom section still standing upright. This dropped the antenna below the line of site signal. This also made it more difficult to erect a new tower, as the old one had to be unassembled and removed first." - Larry Douglas

http://www.beatriceco.com/bti/porticus/bell/longlines-expdam.html

 

[Gorm]

Here is the one from Iowa County:

http://iowa.iowaassessors.com/parcel.php?gid=17194

Looks like Iowa County lists the value of the tower at around 5000 more than the land.

Also interesting that a different owner owns this tower. Looks like ATT probably sold them off at some point.

The thing is huge...can't miss it driving between Iowa City and Amana on U.S. 6.

 

[wxman1]

I remember a microwave tower on the south side of CR. Not sure if it is still there.

 

[c.y.c.l.o.n.e.s]

Now I really wish I saw what c.y.c.l.o.n.e.s posted before he took it down!

Sorry, Not all that exciting. Just posted what Brianhos posted above. If you go to their website, there are basic diagrams of the bunker and some of the safety specs - including the fact that it was designed to survive a near miss nuclear blast. The only reason that I deleted my post is because they don't specifically mention on their website where the bunker is. It is really cool.