One cell tower on campus not good enough for you? Now you have three more.

Actually, they are cell “sites,” atop buildings: Chemistry Annex (Sprint), Hutchison Hall (AT&T) and Kerr Hall (T-Mobile) — all in the central part of the Davis campus. And T-Mobile has proposed two more sites: atop Kemper Hall and on a light pole at the Hutchison Intramural Field.

“We’re getting some positive feedback from people who are noticing better signals popping up on their phones,” said Zack O’Donnell of Communications Resources, part of Information and Educational Technology.

While cell phone users are happier with their reception, the university is happy with the revenue from the cell site license agreements: about $1.15 million over 10 years, from the first four sites alone.

The three new sites, each of which became operational within the last month and a half, join the cell site put in a year ago by Verizon atop a light pole at the Howard IM Field, next to the north entry garage.

Before that, the Davis campus had only one cell site — on the west side of Highway 113 — making for spotty coverage on the central campus.

“Cell phone users should be getting significantly better coverage, depending on their carrier,” O’Donnell said.

At least two carriers, AT&T and T-Mobile, are reporting a surge in calls in and out of campus, indicating that cell coverage indeed is better, O’Donnell said. The companies are exploring whether to add capacity, simply by leasing more T-1 cable space from the university.

T-1s are high-capacity, highly reliable signal transmission lines that connect cellular sites with the cell companies’ networks.

Besides leasing cable space, the companies are paying monthly license fees for the cell sites. The fees start at $2,000 a month and go up annually a minimum of 4 percent to account for inflation.

At the starting fee of $2,000 a month, each license agreement will bring in at least $288,147 over 10 years, including the minimum inflation factor of 4 percent. The four completed deals, therefore, are worth a minimum of $1.15 million.

If T-Mobile adds two more sites, the university’s total take would be about $1.73 million over 10 years.

Each license agreement comes with an option for a five-year extension, which could boost the university’s total revenue to $2.88 million over 15 years.

Originally, the university planned to put the money into a central discretionary fund for use by the chancellor and provost. That has changed: Now the money is going to support the campus data network.

Cell tower construction updates and a map: cellsites.ucdavis.edu.