5
AT&T Long Lines "Oak Hill" Tower, San Jose (cdn.masto.host)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/photography@fedia.io
13 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

AT&T Long Lines "Oak Hill" Tower, San Jose. CA. 2021.All the pixels, delivered station-to-station, or, for a small additional charge, person-to-person, at flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/51#photography

A heavy-duty Brutalist-style concrete tower, with multiple levels of platforms supporting various microwave antennas, including "horn" antennas, on a hilltop behind a fence.
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [S] 1 point 11 months ago (5 children)

The San Jose Oak Hill Tower is unique in a number of ways. This particular concrete brutalist design appears not to have been exactly replicated elsewhere; it was site-specific. It sits atop an underground switching center (that was partly used for a military contract), which explains the relatively hardened design.Today the underground switch is still there, owned by AT&T, but the tower space is leased to land mobile and cellular providers. The old horn antennas at top are disconnected

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
    •
  • [–] [S] 1 point 11 months ago (4 children)

    With a few exceptions (mostly towers atop downtown switching offices in populated areas), no one was trying to make any of this utilitarian communications infrastructure beautiful. It was form strictly following function, built to be reliable and rugged.But there was, I think, quite a bit of beauty to find in it. Perhaps we'll look at our current neighborhood cellular towers, now often regarded as visual blight, the same way decades after they're (inevitably) gone.Infrastructure is heroic.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
    •
  • [–] 1 point 11 months ago (2 children)

    @mattblaze In my mind one of the most interesting comparisons is that of the Golden Gate bridge as built versus what was originally proposed.Both designs were "functional". But the original design by Strauss was a visual disaster while the as-built by Charles Ellis is a world-class gem. (Strauss was so jealous of Ellis that Ellis name was not to be found on the name plaque on the south tower - I don't know if his name was ever added later.)Below is the original design, yuck. And we all know what was built.goldengate.org/assets/1/6/ggb-

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
  • [–] [S] 1 point 11 months ago (1 child)

    @karlauerbach Looks almost like a drawbridge!

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
    •
  • [–] 1 point 11 months ago

    @mattblaze Strauss had only designed short drawbridges before taking on the Golden Gate. There are a couple of Strauss designed drawbridges over China Basin near the SF. baseball park, such as the one below...en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lefty_O%en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lefty_O%

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent