Forget Yosemite. How's your cellphone coverage in LA?

We recently wrote about how it's nearly impossible to get cellphone reception in remote areas of California's national parks, especially with some cellular companies (we're talking to you, T-Mobile). Judging by the reader response, we should have written about how it's nearly impossible to get cellphone reception in some heavily populated regions of Los Angeles.

Readers let me know about calls dropped consistently in places like Old Town Pasadena, Chinatown and Ventura Boulevard (more on dead zones later). Peter Linney, a Norwegian auto photographer, wrote that compared with Europe and Japan, when it comes to cellphone reception the U.S. "is still driving a '69 Volkswagen."

"I call it Swiss cheese coverage," says Wayne Coombs, a Hollywood resident. He's thinking of ditching Verizon for AT&T, because he travels a lot for work and is sick of not being able to make calls even in some urban areas. Although he's not sure AT&T will be any better.

There are a few reasons you might be experiencing dropped calls, even in the middle of the city. Maybe too many people are gabbing on their phones at the same time, and the network just can't handle your call. Or maybe there's a hill or other impediment blocking the signal. If you're dropping them consistently in the same place, you are probably switching from one cell tower to the next, and there's something about the transition that doesn't quite work. Or maybe you're just in West Virginia.

There's not much you can do except complain to your carrier. Make sure to include the time of day that the call is usually dropped: Your carrier can shift coverage in different directions at certain times of day, Verizon spokesman Ken Muche said.

Or else you can just take solace in the fact that you're not the only one who suffers from dropped calls at the weirdest of locations. After the jump we've included a list of places where people commonly lose their reception -- and we have a feeling you'll tell us about more once Californians start chatting up a storm today, trying to get their money's worth on their new hands-free devices. Any dead areas that you know of? Speak up or forever drop your calls!

The list is ...

... by no means a complete catalog of dead zones in Southern California. For that you could try DeadCellZones or Signal Map (although, in describing itself, the latter says "Beta is an understatement"). This is just a list of places where some L.A. Times readers and staffers have had particular trouble with reception.

Los Angeles

Silver Lake Boulevard and Duane Street (Sprint)

Kenilworth Avenue and Angus Street (T-Mobile)

Getting on the 110 Freeway from 3rd Street (T-Mobile)

Broadway and the 101 Freeway (AT&T)

2nd Street between Figueroa Street and Broadway (T-Mobile)

Broadway between Temple Street and Cesar Chavez Avenue (AT&T)

Olympic Boulevard east of La Brea Avenue (T-Mobile)

Sunset Boulevard and Gower Street (Verizon)

Getting on the 2 Freeway from Glendale Boulevard to the 5 Freeway (T-Mobile)

Stadium Way and Academy Road (T-Mobile)

Beverly Boulevard and Temple Street (T-Mobile)

2nd and Hill streets (T-Mobile)

The Valley and points north

Vanalden Avenue south of Ventura Boulevard, Tarzana (Verizon)

Foothill Freeway between Sunland Boulevard and La Tuna Canyon Road exits (Verizon)

110 Freeway at Glenarm Street (AT&T)

In Altadena, Lake Avenue and E Loma Alta Drive (T-Mobile)

South Bay and Orange County

On the 710 Freeway between the 405 and the 91 freeways (T-Mobile)

In Long Beach, Spring Street between Los Alamitos Boulevard and Palo Verde Avenue (Verizon)

In Fullerton, Euclid Street and Rosecrans Avenue (Verizon)

In Orange, Chapman Avenue near the bottom of the hill (T-Mobile)

73 toll road near Laguna Canyon Road (Verizon)

Patches along Newport Coast Drive (Verizon)

Eastbound

In Upland, near the intersection of Mountain Avenue and 19th Street (T-Mobile)

In Pomona, the 10 Freeway at the 57 Freeway, near Forest Lawn (T-Mobile)

The 210 Freeway just past the Mountain Avenue exit (AT&T)

The intersection of the 5 and the 710 freeways (AT&T)

-- Alana Semuels

Semuels, a Times staff writer, covers marketing and the L.A. tech scene.

Photo: The Mojave phone booth, in the middle of the desert. Credit: Associated Press

Comments

[Scott Goldman]

While it's easy to complain about cellular coverage it's also important to understand how incredibly difficult it is to provide comprehensive, continuous coverage to an area like Los Angeles. This city is a cellular engineering nightmare with canyons, mountains, dense population, freeways overloaded with traffic, foliage, a zillion square miles to cover within the metro area - and all done in the face of regular protests from people who want coverage in their back yard without having a cell tower there.

After 20+ years of experience building and running cellular-related companies I can tell you one thing for sure: Every carrier's coverage stinks - just in different places. And one of the main reasons why places like Asia and Europe are so much further ahead in their coverage (they are _much_ further ahead) is that cellular coverage hadn't been as critical here as it was there for one simple reason: Their landline phone systems are pathetic.

In Europe and Asia phone companies don't spend much on developing their landline services and, because they are almost always the same companies that own the cellular systems, they pour that money into their wireless systems.

There's another reason, too, which has to do with the government's regulation of the cellular company's technology about 20 years ago - they forced all carriers to use GSM technology whereas here in the U.S. that decision was left for each carrier to determine individually. That was probably NOT a good thing here but it is what it is and because there weren't any battles over which technical standard to use the European and Asian communities devoted their efforts to building expansive, penetrating cellular phone systems.

The most difficult process for cellular companies today isn't building new cell sites to enhance their coverage, though, it's getting neighborhoods and individuals to agree to allow a cell site nearby. The resistance is enormous and is usually loudest by the people who complain most vociferously about the lack of coverage in the area. You can't have it both ways - either allow some cell sites in the local area or quit complaining about the coverage.

Scott Goldman
aka The Wireless Wizard (www.TheWirelessWizard.com)

Encino, south of Ventura, west of 405, east of Balboa (Verizon)

Sapphire Drive, Encino (Verizon) I've been told by Verizon that I live in a "challenged" area. Nuts!

[Sandy Geniesse]

Inadequate coverage in many places was the reason for terminating my coverage with TMobile but I do find that my coverage with Verizon does work at some National Parks (tMobile did not) TMobile did not even work in my house (Pasadena, 2 blocks from the TMobile store on Lake) for the 3 years I had this service although TMobile kept promising it would. It didn't work in my old office in Torrance either. I do not find coverage with Verizon to be a problem and in fact I am writing them a letter to compliment them.

[Randy Schoenberg]

T-Mobile always drops on San Vicente north of 7th street in Santa Monica.

[Danielle]

I have not had too many problems getting coverage with Verizon. The one thing that drives me nuts about their coverage is in my house or apartment. I'm from Southern California, and currently live in Northern California, and it doesn't matter which place I go the coverage is terrible. At home I move a foot one way or the other and my signal goes from one bar to zero. I don't get it. Why is my coverage so bad in these places? And why does the signal strength change so much (sometimes just switching ears)?

[Michael]

How about Sunset, like the whole way from Bundy until you get into Pali? I'm all, "can you hear me now" the whole damn way!

I <3 You, AT&T

[Karen B]

Lots of the Palos Verdes Peninsula is tough for many services. I have a friend who lives right by the Country Club, off via Campesino, and it's always a challenge to call out from there.

Certain parts of the Baldwin Hills and View Park have dead spots, too.

[permo]

Elysian Park and Sunset, every time. Sorry Dodger fans and Elysian Park shortcut commuters!

[buzz]

Sepulveda Blvd, north of the Skirball, just past the tunnel (Verizon).

[Kev]

(Verizon) Mt. Washington - W. Ave 37 just west/north of Kite Hill. Cell works on main and bottom floors of house, but there is a constant dropping of calls on the top floor.

[Caroline Altman]

I have Verizon. We live in Cheviot Hills just East of Motor Avenue. We are 8 miles from downtown. Our coverate is spotty in the house. We play golf at Calabasas Country Club. Verizon has NO coverage. The homes in the adjacent area as well as the golf club itself. When I am about to reach the 101 freeway the reception appears. In desparation I bought a ATT Go phone . My Husband switched to T Mobil because it can be used in most any country as it can link up with the local providers. Europe is 99 cents a minute which is the best you can get. There is no roaming charges. However South Africa and Botswana and other exotic places are as much as 4.95 per minute! T Mobile and ATT work in Calabasas. I called Verizon and they said that EVENTUALLY they will get around to putting a cell up there maybe in two or three years! Comfortoing yes?

[Ginny-Marie Case]

My favorite Drop Spots:

On 6th Street between Spring and Main Streets.

The 110 freeway between the Fair Oaks and Orange Grove exits

Half of Malibu

My Doctor's Office (Although I'm starting to think that's intentional)

[WeHo19]

Used to commute to Warner Bros in Burbank. Every morning and every evening the drop out was on Barham on the hill next to Universal Studios. Exact same spot. Also, on the commute home down Outpost, there is no coverage from the top of the hill almost to Hollywood Blvd. Verizon.

[DeadCellZones.com]

The article forgot to mention that you can add your complaints to the user generated map. We are at about 6000+ in the database for the last 12 months. I see carriers IP addresses every day reading the complaints on the site. Carriers use coverage complaint information to prioritize their network repair operations.

http://www.deadcellzones.com

[Duan Dao]

If you want better service write letters, call you city council person and demand that they speed wireless permits through the review process and when you do get noticification of a project go and show your support. Often times you have a few that are against it that show up and the people that actually want the service dont even take the time to voice their support. So dont be too hasty to blame the carriers for having the dreaded deadzones because believe it or not they're all very aware of it; it shows up on their call statistics. They just need everyone to support their projects.

[James]

Having gone from verizon (horrible customer service) to AT&T (bad coverage in Sherman Oaks) I went to t-mobile. I have had better coverage than the previous two providers, maybe it is my phone a Dash PDA. Regardless I would stay with t-mobil for the simple reason that they provide courteous and great customer service. I can live without a cell phone, as many did prior to having one, but will not stand for rude or bad service. Honestly I would rather have a pager and a calling card (if we still had pay phones) than be subjected to bad service. Something that can be, or should be fixed faster than dead zones. What has happened to having pride in our work and pride in ourselves that we would subject ourselves to bad customer service.

[smokeonit]

there's also the factor that cell phones in cars without an external antenna have much worse reception, especially if the windows have special coating... most people will blame the cell phone coverage instead of their own hardware...!

the best is to have an external antenna on top of the roof, standard with OEM car setups.

[Sprintuser]

People talk all kinds of stuff about Sprint, yet their coverage in the L.A. city area has been almost flawless for me.

Go figure.

[Mac Lover]

As a Mac user since 1984 I really wanted an iPhone, but AT&T coverage in LA is so bad (including my house) that I stick with Sprint which has great coverage. Guess I'll give their Instinct phone a try...

[Matt Landry]

My wife and I just moved to LA from Toronto Canada. Although we love the sun and the atmosphere, we feel that technology-wise this city is lagging behind big time (internet bandwith is pathetic, cell phones coming with plans are cheaply build, wireless coverage is bad, plans are too expensive). We got a T-Mobile 10$ chip to try out that provider and half the way between Marina Del Rey and Santa Monica, we could not get connected. That's simply sad.