You may have noticed a couple of big gray boxes sitting on concrete slabs on someone’s side yard at the intersection of Caldwell and Mendota Ave in Wildwood, wondering what they are.
Well, they’re called “Video Ready Access Devices”, or VRADs for short. These cabinets provide DSL and HDTV signals/service to customers who have subscribed to AT&T’s U-Verse product.

Typically, AT&T installs VRADs on utility easements, as is the case with this VRAD on Mendota. These cabinets are beginning to mushroom in the Chicagoland area, more so in the suburbs than in Chicago. To some, these big boxes are quite unsightly, but in the case of this VRAD in Wildwood, AT&T has done a pretty good job of sort of hiding it behind a tall wooden fence. The neighbor to the immediate north of the easement though, may not be too happy about this VRAD, because he is looking right at it from his property. A similar fence like the one the neighbors on the south have might be the solution to the problem, though. In any event, these VRADs service a geographical radius of about 3,000 feet.

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