Resource Sharing: Wireless Telecommunications Site Lease Rates

“Resource sharing” refers to projects that use public right-of-way for telecommunications facilities and that result in some form of compensation to the public agency. The facilities most often installed are transmitter antennas supported on aboveground structures (wireless facilities) or buried fiber-optic cable. Research indicates that fewer than 10 state departments of transportation (DOTs) are leasing or licensing wireless sites to telecommunication companies, but many more states desire data concerning the revenue that they might receive from such installations. The current range of fees that state DOTs receive from the telecommunications companies for the wireless sites, and the fees that the DOTs receive from other companies (colocators) that place their facilities on a structure owned by a first locator, are described. The typical site locations, the group (DOT versus company) that identifies lease sites, typical support structures for the antennas, the manner in which the revenue may be used in the various states, and legal difficulties associated with wireless resource sharing are also described.