While fish mongering is one of the oldest professions in New York City, the new fish market in the Bronx is having a very modern problem: cell phone dead spots.

Dead spots, one of Mayor Bloomberg’s pet peeves, are so rampant at the new home of the Fulton Fish Market at Hunts Point that thousands of fish purveyors and their customers have been told to switch cell phone carriers before the big move to the new market.

“A lot of customers at the market buy fish, fresh fish, and buy it in large quantities to resell it or process it at their restaurant,” the manager of the new market, George Maroulis, said. “So timing is an issue. The way they deal with that is their cell phones.”

When the Fulton Fish Market opened its doors in 1822, it became the destination for fishing boats from across the Atlantic Ocean. Back then, of course, cell phones had nothing to do with fish. Horses and buggies helped transport the fish away from the market, and Alexander Graham Bell, who would invent the telephone in 1870, was not yet born.

The modern market is quite different.

“Everything nowadays has been tuned to use the technologies that are available today,” Mr. Maroulis said. “In most economic models, you’re looking for knowledge, a knowledgeable buyer to make a decision.”

At the market in Lower Manhattan, which is scheduled to close imminently – as soon as a legal dispute is resolved – and move to Hunts Point, the majority of buyers and sellers use Nextel Wireless as they survey the fish selection in the early morning hours and try to lock in the lowest rates. They like it, Mr. Maroulis said, for its walkie-talkie capabilities.

When Mr. Maroulis first set foot inside the new, refrigerated 400,000-square-foot facility in the Bronx, however, he knew there was a problem. Nextel service was spotty to nonexistent.

Mr. Maroulis approached the city’s Economic Development Corporation, which built and owns the new fish market facility. The development corporation helped set up meetings with the wireless companies, but Nextel representatives told the fish market manager that installing a new antenna could cost about $500,000, and the business of the thousands of fishmongers and the buyers who work in the market each night would probably not be enough to recover that investment.

Verizon Wireless was more accommodating. The company plans to in stall technology inside the new facility to capture the wireless signal from outside and repeat it inside, a Verizon Wireless spokesman, David Samberg, said.

A spokeswoman for Sprint Nextel, Lisa Malloy, said her company is still considering accommodating the fish market.

A spokeswoman for the Economic Development Corporation, Janel Patterson, said the city has been working closely with Nextel and the fish market to resolve the situation. “Nextel has informed us that they are in the process of designing a new cell site

that would bring this service to the new market, and they will know in about 60 days how to proceed,” Ms. Patterson said.

Mr. Maroulis, however, said he is not waiting. He sent his colleagues a letter instructing them to switch to Verizon, and said he expects that most people will change carriers before the move.

The fish market’s cell phone difficulties come despite the fact that the facility is owned by New York City, which has clearly stated its desire to ramp up its cell phone service.

Almost two years ago, the mayor vowed to crack down on cell phone dead spots. He urged New Yorkers to call 311 to report dropped calls, saying, “Cell phones generally provide a great service. The trouble is that every once in a while cell phones don’t work, and cell phones don’t work exactly at the wrong time or in places that you are, and it’s very annoying.”

In the aftermath of that announcement, the city mapped the problem areas, talked to the cell phone carriers, and has been figuring out ways to make it easier for cell phone carriers to install antennas.

The commissioner of the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications, Gino Menchini, said that though he remains unsatisfied with New York’s wireless service, there have been some improvements.

His department has granted six franchises for companies to install wireless units on light poles throughout the city. The Art Commission is in the process of approving the design of the box that will be mounted on the polls.