Classic Answer Man fesses up to his failures, mysteries

Note: This column originally was published Sept. 26, 2014.

Sometimes, I fail — spectacularly.

Yes, some of you may not find that surprising, but it's true. Since going daily with the column in the spring, I get probably three or four questions a day.

Some I just can't get to because of the sheer volume. Some, I just can't get answers to.

So today, I'm going to go with a mystery theme: questions I can't get completely satisfying answers to.

You know I always have a smart-aleck response, mysterious question or not, even when the real answer proves elusive.

Question: On Gaston Mountain in the Scratch Ankle area near Sardis Road, there's a cell tower there that has no lights. How in the world is a tower sitting on a mountain with no warning lights?

My answer: Guy wires?

Real answer: Before getting to my failure, can I mention how much I enjoy living in a place with an area called "Scratch Ankle?" I bet it's not far from "Blow Nose" and "Comb Hair."

At any rate, back in the spring I actually drove out to this area and tried to take a picture of said tower with my phone, but it was so far away I couldn't get a decent shot. The closest road wouldn't take me too far before I started hitting "private road" signs.

So I called a federal agency spokesman in Atlanta. I'm pretty sure it was a Federal Communications Commission guy, but I'm not going to lie — it might've been an FAA dude. At any rate, he told me he'd need a pretty exact GPS coordinate for the tower before addressing the lighting issue.

So, I, ahem, let it slide to the back burner. Seriously, what am I — a satellite?

At any rate, the FCC does have a lot of information about this subject online (http://transition.fcc.gov/mb/policy/dtv/lighting.html), and the upshot is the FCC does have the authority to "require the painting and/or illumination of antenna towers when it determines that such towers may otherwise constitute a menace to air navigation." The Federal Aviation Administration sets the standards.

"Although the FAA's lighting and painting standards are advisory in nature, the FCC's rules make the standards mandatory," the website reads. "The standards and specifications set forth in these FAA documents are incorporated by reference into the FCC's rules, making these advisory standards mandatory for antenna towers."

It gets more boring.

The website Ehow notes, "Any structure taller than 200 feet is subject to FAA lighting requirements. Structures that are shorter than this height may also require lighting, depending on the structure's location. Some lighting requirements are determined by FAA aeronautical studies of the area in which the structure will be located. These studies may also determine that a structure of the proscribed height requiring lighting, may not present an aviation hazard without the lighting."

All right, so that's a pretty lame answer, but maybe this tower is less than 200 feet and didn't need lights.

Anybody know anything more about this? I'm all ears (I wonder if "All Ears" is a community somewhere in WNC…)

Question: A few weeks ago I saw in the paper where Biltmore Company bought back the property they sold Henderson County several years ago, property in the Bent Creek area. Now they are hauling in heavy equipment, dump trucks and all sorts of stuff, off of Ferry Road. My property joins that property and I would love to know what is going on. We have heard everything from condos to amusement park to firing range. All of us in the area will love you forever if you can find out.

My answer: Trust me, folks, it's not easy to fail when you have this much detail. I suspect it's going to be a firearm amusement park with on-site condos.

Real answer: I asked the Biltmore Estate folks about this, and they had no knowledge of any estate-related development in that area.

So I checked with Biltmore Farms Co., the development company run by Jack Cecil. He was baffled, too.

"We sold some land at the end of Ferry Road years ago for a water plant, to the city, but that was 25 years ago or so," Cecil said. "So I have no idea what's going on at the end of Ferry Road."

The Buncombe County Permits Department had no knowledge of a big development coming that way.

So I drove out Ferry Road to solve the mystery myself. I just saw a bunch of well-kept houses and lawns, and nary an indication of big development. As this question came from a caller and I don't have the phone number anymore, I'm open to another call or more detail, from someone.

Really, I hate a mystery.

Question: One whole part of Beaver lake is covered with an algae bloom. I know no one drinks from the lake, but dogs swim in it and drink the water. Is it harmful to animals? And what's going on with the water level?

My answer: I guarantee you this is related to the all the development off Ferry Road.

Real answer: OK, this one I'm putting in the "mystery" category mainly because it's taken the Lake View Park commission folks more than a week to get back to me about this. It doesn't seem that complicated to me, but who knows — maybe it's a Frankenstein, dog-eating algae bloom they got going on out there.

I suspect we'll nail this one down soon. I'd really like to move it out of my "failure" category.

This is the opinion of John Boyle, jboyle@citizen-times.com.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Classic Answer Man fesses up to his failures, mysteries