St. Mary's Board of Appeals approves Queen Tree cell tower despite neighborhood objections

The St. Mary's County Board of Appeals voted to approve a conditional use application for a proposed 199-foot monopole at Wentworth Nursery near Oakville Road, allowing Telecom Capital Group (TCG) to build a new cell site to improve coverage along Maryland Route 235.

The decision came after applicants presented engineering, RF and environmental studies and answered board questions about height, siting, setbacks and noise. The board's vote followed public comments from nearby residents who said the tower would be visually intrusive and voiced health and property-value concerns; the board and staff noted federal preemption of RF health standards where facilities meet FCC limits.

Applicants said the monopole, proposed to serve Verizon as the anchor tenant, is 195 feet tall with an additional 4-foot lightning rod for a total structural height of 199 feet. "The monopole itself is 195 feet. On top of the 195 feet is a 4 foot, lightning rod. So the total height of the facility is 199 feet," testified Matt Budd, the project's civil engineer. Budd also said the compound will be a pad roughly 63 by 63 feet and that the fenced equipment area is a 60-by-60-foot compound set back from adjacent parcels.

Why it matters: County staff and applicants said the new site fills capacity and coverage gaps on MD-235 and at the Lovell Road intersection that existing towers do not serve. Manish Derezia of Telecom Capital Group said the RF study submitted with the application shows existing nearby sites (North Sandgate, Mary Dixon, Memorialville) are outside the…