Gurnee rejects cell tower on Great America property

Visitors to Six Flags Great America in Gurnee will have to get by with the wireless connection they currently receive there.

Gurnee village board members Monday rejected a proposal for a 150-foot cellular tower on Great America property that would have boosted coverage inside the theme park. The tower would have risen near Six Flags Parkway and Elsie Avenue.

Proximity of the 150-foot tower to a residential neighborhood and its appearance were among the concerns expressed to Gurnee officials since the plan surfaced in July.

But Ashley Blaeser and Pete Aimaro of National Wireless Ventures LLC, who represented Horvath Tower in the request, cited a lack of coverage, dropped calls and dead space in and around Great America as reasons the monopole should be built. Horvath had a tentative deal to build the tower on Great America's land, officials said.

Gurnee Mayor Kristina Kovarik said while she understood the request, the tower would have been detrimental to residents living near Great America to the east.

"There's a huge demand inside Six Flags for downloads and posting pictures on social media," Kovarik said. "And I said, 'I can appreciate that, but people are coming there to enjoy the park and maybe they won't have the best (wireless) coverage, but that cellphone (tower) is going to impact that neighborhood."

Great America spokeswoman Katy Enrique issued a statement regarding the cellular tower rejection.

"Our priority is to provide our guests with the best service possible and on peak days, a cell tower would be a definite benefit," Enrique said. "We currently do not offer Wi-Fi."

Under the proposal, the Gurnee village board needed to issue a special-use permit to Horvath for the tower construction to occur. The tower initially would have been for T-Mobile, with room for equipment from three additional wireless carriers.

Monday's village board vote isn't the first time elected officials responded to residents' complaints about cellular tower construction.

In 2009, T-Mobile originally wanted to place a tower on unincorporated land bordering the South Ridge and Rolling Ridge subdivisions, near Hunt Club Road and Washington Street on Gurnee's west side.

Gurnee forcibly annexed less than an acre of the unincorporated property off Hunt Club Road that had been pegged for the T-Mobile tower to bring it under village control. The property owner complained his land was forcibly brought into Gurnee just to thwart T-Mobile's cell tower.