The Los Angeles Regional Interoperable Communication System (LA-RICS) is a state of the art, wireless telecommunications system designed and built to serve government, military, law enforcement, fire service, park rangers and health service professionals. The system will provide interagency communications for responding to routine, emergency and terrorist events. (The greater Los Angeles Region is designated as a high-threat area by the Department of Homeland Security.) It will be used to enhance and expedite communications between the aforementioned authorized agencies and emergency responders throughout Los Angeles County. Eleven federal grants with a combined value of $250 million were awarded to Los Angeles County to help fund the project with the remaining balance of about $500 million to be passed on to the taxpayers. Subsequently, the Federal Government plans to add similar emergency services in large metropolises throughout the U.S., eventually interconnecting each regional system creating a unified National Broadband System.

There are 232 LTE (Long-Term Evolution) sites identified for the completion of the network using both stealth and standard monopoles with heights ranging from 28 thru 70 depending on individual community mandates. There are 40 of those sites that will also have LMR (Land Mobile Radio) towers with heights not to exceed 180. In addition, stringent mitigation measures have to be observed to ensure that any environmental impact is reduced to a level deemed less than significant.

The latest self-supporting, galvanized steel tri-pod (LMR) tower that has been constructed is 109 tall and is located at an existing communications facility at the top of Mount Lukens in the San Gabriel Mountains of Southern California. Corrosion control over the service life of the tower was of supreme importance to guarantee the tower would be a reliable part of the new emergency communication infrastructure. The design team concluded that the best way to accomplish this was to build the tower using hot-dip galvanized steel that included pipe columns, tube columns, grates, angle, channel, ladders and handrails. The innovative tower design was a good application for hot-dip galvanizing due to the fact that very little field welding was required during erection. The various tower components had wired identification tags secured to them throughout the entire galvanizing process helping to quantify and collate the material when it arrived at the Mount Lukens site. Both hot-dip galvanizing and design ingenuity were key ingredients in addressing cost control pertaining to fabrication, galvanizing and final assembly of the tower based in an isolated remote location. The tower at Mount Lukens is ready to be put into service as soon as the (LA-RICS) initiative goes online countywide.                         

The hot-dip galvanizing industry is proud to have played such an instrumental part in this monumental and historic undertaking and we anticipate an overall positive impact on the hot-dip galvanizing market in the upcoming years as additional broadband sites throughout the U.S. are constructed and require galvanizing services to help combat environmental corrosion.