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Channel 17 Tower, an Atlanta Landmark, to Come Down

R

RoddyFreeman

You see it in virtually all photos of the Atlanta skyline. The Channel 17 (WPCH-TV, formerly WTBS-TV) tower at 1018 W. Peachtree Street will be taken down by early fall.

The Turner deal with the landlord is Turner has 120 days to take the tower down if it ceases to be a main transmission site. So the tower will have to be dismantled by 120 days after the digital conversion on June 12. Since the demolition will cost about $2 million, the Channel 17 chief engineer recommended moving the digital antenna there, but Turner wanted to be done with that site.

I was in the building (originally WAGA-TV) recently, and the entire place has been gutted except for the transmitter room in the basement. We needed a flashlight to get down some of the steps.

The Channel 17 digital site is at Richland. The WWWQ-FM auxiliary antenna, which is also on the tower, will probably move to the Channel 69 tower off I-20.

Comcast owns the W. Peachtree Street property.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
The Channel 17 digital site is at Richland. The WWWQ-FM auxiliary antenna, which is also on the tower, will probably move to the Channel 69 tower off I-20.
Click to expand...

The Gannett engineers tell me that they (17) also have an analog site at Richland, and use the midtown tower as a backup. WATL is on the same tower and the owner (Upsouth) requested a power down the other night in order to install another FM on the tower. The PCH guys just powered off and used the midtown tower, from what I was told.
 
Maybe the Gannett engineer was talking about Q100. Their main antenna is on the newer Richland tower, and the aux is on the W. Peachtree tower. But the Midtown tower is the analog site for WPCH-TV; they have no analog at Richland. A new FM is going up at Richland for the new Cumulus translator at 97.9.
 
Lot's of memories for me at the W. Peachtree site. I sure hate to see it come down. I started working at ch. 17 as an on air switcher for WTCG IN 1977 and worked at that site till the move to Techwood. I remember once when the tower was painted my v/w beetle and lot's of other cars got red and white paint all over them. Of course Turner's insurance picked up the tab.
 
Good, I think it takes away from the skyline and does not fit in the middle of the city.
Also a very reliable source at Turner told me that the tower is somewaht unstable and dangerous.
 
Man, this is weird. My wife and I were having lunch at the Varsity today and we were talking about the WTBS tower coming down. I hope Comcast takes that ugly microwave tower, next to the WTBS tower, down as well. The aging microwave dishes and fading paint make that tower the eyesore in my opinion.
 
Good! Maybe they'll tear down the whole building and squeeze in another 25-story condo unit that can sit there at about 30% occupancy. Midtown needs a few more of those.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
The Channel 17 digital site is at Richland. The WWWQ-FM auxiliary antenna, which is also on the tower, will probably move to the Channel 69 tower off I-20.

Comcast owns the W. Peachtree Street property.
Click to expand...

What does Comcast use the property for? I thought most of everything technical was run out of Vinings and Stone Mountain, and regional HQ and CSS offices in Norcross.

As for Q100's backup...they probably will not move it. It sounds like when they moved, they just left the old stuff there, and probably just kept it ready for backup. I don't know of anyone else in town with a backup facility.

The tower is self-supporting. I know nothing about engineering, but wouldn't it be safer then a regular stick tower being held up by guy wires? Even so, any type of structure can become dangerous.

Also...how are they going to get it down. There is a freeway and several surface roads next to it.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
Maybe the Gannett engineer was talking about Q100. Their main antenna is on the newer Richland tower, and the aux is on the W. Peachtree tower. But the Midtown tower is the analog site for WPCH-TV; they have no analog at Richland. A new FM is going up at Richland for the new Cumulus translator at 97.9.
Click to expand...

Ah, I was curious who the new FM was. The engineer didn't know. And, that clears about the aux. He did tell me the Turner guys just powered down the Richland site and went to the aux for the install. We don't have an aux for WATL, so we couldn't do that.
 
Many of the in-town FM's have backup sites. Q100/WNNX on the WTBS tower, WSB-f has one at the channel 2 tower. WVEE has backup at Richland, WZGC has backup at New Street. WSTR is somewhere near 17th and Northside.
 
jal41 said:
RoddyFreeman said:
The Channel 17 digital site is at Richland. The WWWQ-FM auxiliary antenna, which is also on the tower, will probably move to the Channel 69 tower off I-20.

Comcast owns the W. Peachtree Street property.
Click to expand...

What does Comcast use the property for? I thought most of everything technical was run out of Vinings and Stone Mountain, and regional HQ and CSS offices in Norcross.

As for Q100's backup...they probably will not move it. It sounds like when they moved, they just left the old stuff there, and probably just kept it ready for backup. I don't know of anyone else in town with a backup facility.

The tower is self-supporting. I know nothing about engineering, but wouldn't it be safer then a regular stick tower being held up by guy wires? Even so, any type of structure can become dangerous.

Also...how are they going to get it down. There is a freeway and several surface roads next to it.
Click to expand...

Comcast used to have a dispatch office there where it's Technicians were based. I don't know if they still do or not.
 
Comcast had several trucks parked on the lot, but the building had been gutted except for the transmitter room in the basement. I don't know what the building next door (on the corner) is used for or whether Comcast owns it.

I would think when the economy gets better, Comcast will sell the land to a developer. However, why would they have gutted the building if they don't plan to renovate and use it? If they were planning to demolish it, why gut it first?
 
RoddyFreeman said:
Comcast had several trucks parked on the lot, but the building had been gutted except for the transmitter room in the basement. I don't know what the building next door (on the corner) is used for or whether Comcast owns it.

I would think when the economy gets better, Comcast will sell the land to a developer. However, why would they have gutted the building if they don't plan to renovate and use it? If they were planning to demolish it, why gut it first?
Click to expand...

The first thing that comes to mind is asbestos. The second thing that comes to mind is selling the copper (wiring/plumbing) before some vagrant does it for them and maybe get electrocuted or cause a flood in the process.
 
This thread got me off the fence to get an account and post here.. I'm not in your industry, just a consumer.

I'm watching this thread with great interest because my datacenter is next door to that tower. There's no way removing a structure that large is an easy task.

I'm also surprised.. seems like a waste of infrastructure to pull that tower down instead of finding new customers for it unless there is indeed some other plan for the property.


Neil
WD4NET
 
neilster1 said:
This thread got me off the fence to get an account and post here.. I'm not in your industry, just a consumer.

I'm watching this thread with great interest because my datacenter is next door to that tower. There's no way removing a structure that large is an easy task.

I'm also surprised.. seems like a waste of infrastructure to pull that tower down instead of finding new customers for it unless there is indeed some other plan for the property.


Neil
WD4NET
Click to expand...

It is on the verge of collapse, it is very dangerous. I know this for sure from an engineer at Turner. Contact me and I will give you his name and number.
[email protected], this tower is a huge danger.
 
Actually, if it were in danger of imminent collapse, it would have fallen a year ago in the tornado and high winds. However, the maintenance has to be a drag on finances. It has to be painted by hand, spraying would paint cars and a funeral home across the street. Removing it wouldn't be particularly cheeep either. The top sections - the ones which aren't tapered - are welded 20 foot parts which can be removed and lowered with a gin pole. The remainder of the structure is steel angle assembled in place using drive bolts. These are bolts which are slightly larger than the hole they go in, they're driven in much like a rivet, then a nut is torqued on them. The nuts all have Anco clips on them, so they don't back out over time. Consequently, either each nut must be forced off and then its bolt driven out, or the pieces must be cut apart with a torch in chunks small enough to lower. When it's down to crane height, you could cut the legs and lower large pieces into the lot to be cut up and hauled away.
Figure somewhere between a million and two million to put it on the ground in pieces you could haul to the scrapyard.
 
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