No 3G Coverage in La Crosse WI area

[machz990]

My daughter started college this fall at the University of Wisconsin campus in La Crosse, WI.  I drove up to help her move into her dormatory and was surprised at the total lack of 3G coverage on campus and in the entire city of La Crosse, WI.  I have been to smaller towns in WI and had 3G coverage but this larger city is completely devoid of 3G coverage.  The iPhone 4 she has (plus my iPhone 4 when I'm in La Crosse) shows the Edge network but is painfully slow.  I am surprised at the lack of 3G coverage in this area especially on a college campus with 20,000 students, many of which have AT&T phones.  Most students come from other areas of WI and the midwest and are very disappointed to discover the lack of 3G data on campus.  It becomes even more frustrating when their peers using their new iPhone 4's from Verizon are enjoying full high speed data service.

Also drving back to Madison, WI from La Crosse on Interstate 90 I was disappointed to find no 3G coverage until I was past Wisconsin Dells which is almost 90 minutes of driving on the interstate with no 3G coverage.

Are there any plans to add 3G coverage to La Crosse, WI?

[laxthxdude]

100% agreed.  The issue with coverage for AT&T after the Dells is that they have none.  From just outside La Crosse (West Salem) to the Dells, AT&T's coverage is partner only off from T-Mobiles towers.  The only tower AT&T has is one in Fort McCoy just off from I90 near Sparta however you can't pick the tower signal up from I90.  I'm guessing its stuck like this unless the T-Mobile merger goes through.  If that happens they can flip the switch to bring those towers online to AT&Ts network at least for voice/EDGE and then start adding 3G service to the towers to bring 3G coverage online.  Why AT&T has such lame coverage in southwest WI seems to be a lack of committment here along with conceeding the market to the likes of Verizon and US Cellular.  It use to be Alltel and US Cellular dominated for the most part but VZ was allowed to pick up 100% of the Alltel assets in the area and they didn't have to divest any during the VZ/Alltel merger.  So now we sit with basically no decent GSM provider in the area.  Pretty sad.

As for La Crosse, its just painful as EDGE is unuseable most of the time and all other carriers have 3G in the area and have for quite some time.  In fact, T Mobile turned on 3G coverage as of January this year for the area so AT&T is literally the last carrier not to have 3G in the area of 2 Universities, 1 Tech College and a population of over 120,000 in the area.  Everytime you ask about it they claim its coming soon but that has been their statement for the last 2 years.

[AdmStnBrg]

Yeah, only Edge data and it's so slow. I guess I have to just switch to Verizon when my contract is up.. Still no 3g in 2012!!

[shines34]

Agree, furthermore, where my inlaws live (in Leon, about 20 mins from LaCrosse) AT&T is nonexistant, while verizon and us cellular have decent coverage. Wisconsin needs better coverage AT&T!

[chendanny]

It's sad to see AT&T providing terrible edge coverage to a population of 50,000+ in La Crosse, WI.  Other carriers such as Sprint and Verizon, all have sufficient 3G coverages throughout the city.  I also heard Verizon will be pushing their 4G LTE network to La Crosse in a few months.  For a large corporation that advertises to consumers on how fast their network is, this corporation should also note to the same consumers that their fast network can only be accessed in a very limited amount of places (very is a generous term for AT&T 3G coverage in Western Wisconsin at least).  Also, please stop having the representatives tell wireless suscribers in La Crosse that 3G will be coming soon.  Many have heard of this proclamation since 2009, about 3 years ago.  If AT&T is sincere about pushing 3G to La Crosse, just do it.  Action speaks louder than words.  

[JREwing53]

As much as I hate Verizon, at least when they say they are coming with 4G LTE, it comes very very soon.  Where I live in northern Michigan, ATT has been telling us that they are coming with 3G "soon".  And we still have no 3G.

I think the fact that ATT reps keep telling customers that something is coming "soon" irrates me more than not having it in the first place.

[chendanny]

Verizon now has 4G LTE in La Crosse.  I don't know why AT&T wouldn't just enhance the network here to 3G like all the other carrier providers.  EDGE is too slow and very frustrating to use.