Vodafone St Heliers Bay (2004)

A close-up of the antennas of the Vodafone St Heliers Bay site in July 2004. The antennas, at the time, were brand new and if I recall correctly they were yet to be in service!

Compare this view (taken in July 2004) with an earlier view taken in November 2003. The 2004 view has brand new sector antennas (replacing the older onmi-directional antennas) for the new 3G service as well as increasing 2G capacity.

It is interesting to observe that the microwave dish has not changed. At many other sites that underwent upgrades to provide 3G service, the microwave dish was upgraded to allow more bandwidth. This has not been the case here -- despite 3x UMTS sectors and 3x GSM sectors repacing the old onmi-directional GSM installation!