Call Boxes Planned for mountains "Dead Zones" (Highland Community News 051006)

There are so many dead spots along the Scenic Highway 18 and Highway 330. Both have a lot of area that are Dead to my Cellular Phone. Maybe it is my service, however I know that my friend has the same problem, she has another service However after Aug, 10th, 2006 we will have the same Cellular company. But for the time we have different ones and lousy coverage in the mountains. I will be more secure to travel in the mountains knowing the call boxes are there.

BSRancher

Call boxes planned for mountain ‘dead zones’

By David Avila, Community News Staff Writer

Marilyn Jefferson drives up and down Highway 330 on a daily basis from her Big Bear Lake home. She worries about getting stuck in the mountains.

“I have a cell phone but it doesn't work in certain places,” Jefferson says.

Jefferson is one of thousands of motorists in the San Bernardino County area who can benefit from a new policy of putting emergency call boxes in mountain areas where dead zones prevent cell phone reception.

A new call box policy has been implemented by the San Bernardino Associated Governments (SANBAG) after a request by Big Bear Lake City Councilman Darrell Mulvihill for action following a massive collision of cars last year.

About 350 cars piled up between Big Bear Dam and Snow Valley a year ago with the motorists involved unable to reach emergency call units. It took more than a dozen hours to get response.

Residents were not happy.

Last year more than 33,000 calls were made from emergency call boxes throughout the San Bernardino County area that encompasses an area larger than some states and is the largest county in the country.

“In the future, SANBAG will focus on placing call boxes in the more rural locations of the county where stranded motorists have fewer alternatives for assistance,” said Michelle Kirkhoff, SANBAG's director of Air Quality Mobility.

With Big Bear's population growing quickly in the last decade, along with other mountain and remote desert locations, the need for call boxes has been placed on priority status. A recent survey implemented by SANBAG showed that motorists preferred that call boxes be placed in dead zone areas where cell phones cannot work.

Cheryl Donahue said many motorists have cell phones along the major highways and freeways and that has eliminated the need for thousands of call boxes that line the major roads up and down the state. But in very remote areas like the Mojave Desert, San Bernardino Mountains, San Gabriel Mountains and Sierra Madres, cell phones do not work very well, if at all.

Jefferson knows this is true.

Last year, during the heaviest rainstorms in 100 years, Jefferson's 1967 Ford Mustang stalled and she waited for hours to receive help.

“It was raining so hard I didn't get out of my car,” Jefferson said. “I was hoping a Highway Patrol car would come by, but my husband saw me stuck.”

Jefferson had waited six hours that day in February of 2005, and with the record rainstorm making it impossible for her to flag down anyone, luck was on her side.

“He kind of felt something was wrong,” Jefferson said. “My car battery just died.”

Now, with call box implementation focused on the mountain areas, Jefferson knows that won't happen again.

“That's a pretty good idea,” she said.