Verizon gets OK for new Adirondack cell tower in upstate NY

LAKE PLACID, N.Y. (AP) - Verizon Wireless received approval to build a fourth cell-phone tower along the Adirondack Northway as part of its plan to fill a service gap along remote stretches of the upstate New York interstate.

The Adirondack Park Agency says Verizon can build the 94-foot tower -- which will be disguised to look like a pine tree -- at Schroon Falls about 100 miles north of Albany. That's on the southern edge of a 47-mile so-called "dark zone" on the Northway.

Verizon started adding towers to the Northway after a Brooklyn man crashed and froze to death in January 2007, unable to call for help.

The death prompted a public outcry, and state officials, environmentalists and the New York-based phone company forged an agreement to add towers that blend into the landscape.

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