VALDOSTA — Looking at the Verizon Wireless Summer 2008 guide for service, one finds a major, white gap in coverage availability for Valdosta on a map of the U.S. that’s covered in a deep red to reveal where folks can get a Verizon signal.

On Monday, that will all change. Verizon Wireless will color Valdosta red.

The popular cell phone company will fire up some 130 towers in the Valdosta-Waycross market which stretches from Thomasville to Brunswick, and two new stores in Valdosta — one on Norman Drive by Lowndes High School and another on Northside Drive by the Fantastic Sam’s hair salon — will begin offering a huge menu of products and services to area residents.

A somewhat beleaguered local Cable TV audience that’s been having to endure those entertaining Verizon Wireless commercials — where that huge crowd of Verizon Wireless support staff led by the geeky, short-haired guy wearing Buddy Holly glasses help one lone customer or two — can now stop wondering when the company will ever serve Valdosta.

They’re here, and these folks mean business.

Verizon Wireless has been interested in moving into the Valdosta market for more than two years, but didn’t have the carrier license to operate here. The company finally was able to acquire the license from the previous private carrier, so for more than a year the company has worked diligently to build up infrastructure to meet the company’s high standard for providing the strongest signals available, according to Jeff Mango, president of the company’s Alabama-Georgia sales region.

Mango and the company’s Regional Public Relations Manager Caran Smith are based in the Atlanta area and were in Valdosta last week to shore up the launch and spread the word about it.

“This is a very important market to us,” Mango said. “In order to put in America’s most reliable network, we had to put in 130 towers. That’s 130 real estate acquisitions and 130 builds. So on Monday we will turn on 130 towers and our ‘3-G’ high speed data network. That’s for everything we offer for mobile media, surfing the Web, music downloads and the wireless air cards you put in your laptop computers so you can take it anywhere and get online. It also serves Blackberries and PDAs.”

The launch comes after months of groundwork that brought Andy Rotenstreich, an attorney representing Verizon from Birmingham, Ala., to just about every Greater Lowndes Planning Commission meeting over the past year.

Rotenstreich made regular trips to Valdosta to request rezonings and permits for the new cell towers, pushing the company’s aim to make sure customers can receive signals inside buildings and homes when possible.

“It may not be perfect when we start, but once the launch occurs, we’ll be able to get a better grasp on where any deficiencies might be,” Mango said. “We plan another upgrade in September to shore up the coverage area. We have four people assigned in Georgia as route riders who do nothing but go around checking to see where signals need improvement. We’ve already spent $90 million this year enhancing our network in Georgia.”

The launch area reaches a potential customer base of 316,000 people and covers 5,500 square miles. It includes opening 13 locations that will sell the company’s products and provide customer service. Four of those will be in the Valdosta area. Two of those open Monday.

The 13 company-owned stores, their agents and national retailers will create an additional 100 jobs, Mango said.

Brad Dearth, manager of retail sales at the new Verizon retail store at 1602 Norman Dr., was busy nailing down the last displays and shoring up customer service bays last week to be ready for the big Monday launch.

“We are really excited about serving this growing Valdosta area with some of the best products and services available anywhere to anyone in the world,” Dearth said.