Any thoughts on living next to a high tension power line?

[Brian Elfert]

I've been looking for a large cheap lot to build a new house on. I found one, but I realized the price was probably so low because there is a high tension power line running along one edge of the lot. (Price is $100,000 less than the next cheapest lot in the city.)

What are your thoughts about living next to a high tension power line? Would I regret living there because of the power line?

[John C Lawson]

It's been pretty much proven that there's no health effects from living near a power line http://www.quackwatch.com/01Quackery...opics/emf.html However, that doesn't mean everyone else is convinced of that, so you may have trouble selling when the time comes.

[Chuck Wintle]

I've been looking for a large cheap lot to build a new house on. I found one, but I realized the price was probably so low because there is a high tension power line running along one edge of the lot. (Price is $100,000 less than the next cheapest lot in the city.)

What are your thoughts about living next to a high tension power line? Would I regret living there because of the power line?

I personally would not like living next to a high tension power line. Just too much talk about health problems from the electromagnetic filed they generate.

[George Bokros]

I agree with Chuck on the electromagnetic field issue and John is also correct, it could be an issue when it comes time to sell. Besides both of these issues they are ugly.

George

[Joe Kieve]

Just Google "living next to a high tension power line"...over 30,000,000 sites. Something you'll have to make up your own mind about.........I wouldn't. Apparently you already have some reservations or you wouldn't have asked.

[Dan Hintz]

When you can find 100 studies that say it's safe and 100 studies that say it's bad, many by respectable researchers in the field, it tells you one thing... there is simply not enough evidence either way to make a statistically valid conclusion. Look at all of the hubbub surrounding cellphones and brain tumors... every other year they flip-flop back and forth on whether or not it's harmful.

This really is a case of you needing to make up your own mind... as for me, I'd say no, particularly if I planned on having kids.

[Dave Sheldrake]

Even in the Nuclear industry it is still argued if any radiation is bad for you no matter how small the dose, two of the finest physicists I know still argue from opposite sides.. As Dan said there just isn't enough data one way or then other to form a conclusive opinion for me.

By choice I'd say no but it's your call my friend.

cheers

Dave

[Pat Barry]

Personally I wouldn't want to live to close because I'm sure it would interfere with radio, TV, GPS, and mobile phone signals. As far as the health dangers go, if you are reasonably far away, lets say triple the distance or more from the wire to the ground, you shouldn't have health concerns. I think that no one wants to look out there picture window or relax on the deck with a cell phone tower or high tension power line in the near field of view

[Chuck Wintle]

Personally I wouldn't want to live to close because I'm sure it would interfere with radio, TV, GPS, and mobile phone signals. As far as the health dangers go, if you are reasonably far away, lets say triple the distance or more from the wire to the ground, you shouldn't have health concerns. I think that no one wants to look out there picture window or relax on the deck with a cell phone tower or high tension power line in the near field of view

+1 to that.

[Bill Huber]

I have never lived close to one but I had a friend when I was in Kansas City that did and moved after about a year, just could not take the hum from the line all the time.

I guess that is one thing you need to check, is there a lot of hum where you will be building?

[Matt Meiser]

Technically we do but they are at the back of our 1/4 mile deep property and are around 800-1000' from the house. The back 100' or so there's an easement that they keep tree-free. These are on very tall wood poles not the metal skeleton poles more typically seen. We can see one set of poles (actually on the neighbor's property and the lines aren't real noticeable. Both are becoming more and more obscured every year as I'm letting trees grow in the "back 7" and selectively cut brush to encourage them. By the time we decide to move you probably won't even notice them without going for a walk. Check the easements. I don't think we can put any permanent structure within 2x the height from the centerline or something like that.

They might have messed with our ability to get a good signal from a wireless ISP several year back. Then again the lady that ran that was so incompetent she might have had trouble getting us a service through a 10' Ethernet cable. Haven't noticed any cell problems because of it, especially Verizon because there's a tower < 2 miles away as the crow flies and we have a monitoring device that uses the AT&T network that gets a good signal. We also get a good digital signal for TV off a fairly small antenna from transmitters about 15-20 miles away as the crow flies. We really only see attenuation there during heavy precipitation and even then its watchable.

We looked at 2 properties that were along a petroleum pipeline too. I really like the one (It was on a rare-for-around-here "hill") but we would have had to built the house so far back on the lot that we would have actually had to build my shop in front of the house, meaning spending more on appearance. The pipeline had been rebuilt in the past 10 years so we were told the next major maintenance would be a good 20-30 years off.

[Pat Barry]

Technically we do but they are at the back of our 1/4 mile deep property and are around 800-1000' from the house. The back 100' or so there's an easement that they keep tree-free. These are on very tall wood poles not the metal skeleton poles more typically seen. We can see one set of poles (actually on the neighbor's property and the lines aren't real noticeable. Both are becoming more and more obscured every year as I'm letting trees grow in the "back 7" and selectively cut brush to encourage them. By the time we decide to move you probably won't even notice them without going for a walk. Check the easements. I don't think we can put any permanent structure within 2x the height from the centerline or something like that.

They might have messed with our ability to get a good signal from a wireless ISP several year back. Then again the lady that ran that was so incompetent she might have had trouble getting us a service through a 10' Ethernet cable. Haven't noticed any cell problems because of it, especially Verizon because there's a tower < 2 miles away as the crow flies and we have a monitoring device that uses the AT&T network that gets a good signal. We also get a good digital signal for TV off a fairly small antenna from transmitters about 15-20 miles away as the crow flies. We really only see attenuation there during heavy precipitation and even then its watchable.

We looked at 2 properties that were along a petroleum pipeline too. I really like the one (It was on a rare-for-around-here "hill") but we would have had to built the house so far back on the lot that we would have actually had to build my shop in front of the house, meaning spending more on appearance. The pipeline had been rebuilt in the past 10 years so we were told the next major maintenance would be a good 20-30 years off.

Matt, is the power line in between you and the cell tower? Thats where we seem to have trouble. Once the power line isn't in the line of sight to the cell tower everything is OK

[Matt Meiser]

Line of sight, yes, probably even at the perfect elevation to be between the antennas on the tower and our phones. Our service is reliable enough that we no longer use a landline--Frontier requires it for DSL so its here, but no phone is connected.

[Rich Riddle]

Look at it from an investment standpoint. Many people would not want to purchase property near the lines. That alone makes the market share smaller and less valuable. I could care less about the power lines but wouldn't even consider purchasing property with that large an albatross attached to it.

[Julie Moriarty]

As an electrician, I've heard many discussions about this on the jobsite over the years. As part of our apprenticeship training, we have to learn the workings of electricity and that includes understanding the magnetic fields that surround current traveling through a conductor. High tension lines create large magnetic fields.

The general consensus of the electricians I've worked with is never buy a house that is in close proximity to high tension lines. Roughly 90% felt that way. My ex-in laws lived practically right under them. Every time we went to visit them and humidity was high, I could hear the air crackle. I'll let the science and medical experts debate over the potential health risks, but for me, that crackling sound convinced me I would never buy a house under high tension lines.