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BBC Local Radio Stations that lost their Medium Waves service


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Old 16-11-2010, 09:41
skeptical
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Does anyone know why certain BBC local radio stations had to relinquish their MF band frequencies in 1988 and others were not required to do so.

For example, in the north east BBC Radio Cleveland (now BBC Tees) used to broadcast on 194 metres (1548kHz) in the medium wave band from a transmitter in north Stockton (along with VHF from Bilsdale).

In 1988 the station's medium wave service was dropped, the reason given locally at the time was that all BBC local stations were ending their medium wave services. This was believable as it was the same time that commercial stations were ending 'simulcasting of VHF/MF output.

BBC Radio Cleveland became available on 95FM only. It later transpired that all other BBC stations in the area continued to broadcast on MF including Radio Newcastle (1458kHz, Wrekenton), Radio Cumbria (756, 837,1458 kHz), Radio Leeds (774kHz); Radio Humberside (1485kHz) and Radio York (666,1260kHz).

Does anyone know why the BBC local radio station on Teesside had to close its MF transmitter, bearing in mind 1548kHz is an unused frequency on Teesside and their are over a million people within the coverage area (and some of it such as the North Yorkshire Moors as a patchy VHF signal)?

Are there any other BBC stations that have also lost this useful MF service?
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Old 16-11-2010, 09:52
Powerplay
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BBC Radio Northampton 1107 kHz
BBC Radio Oxford 1485 kHz
BBC Radio Shropshire 756 (now Radio Maldywn)
BBC Radio Gloucestershire 603 kHz, now 1413 only
BBC Radio Kent 1035 kHz (was the Medway service)
BBC Hereford & Worcester 819 kHz (used for Hereford)
BBC Radio Nottingham 1521 kHz

The stations listed above are no longer on those frequencies. This was due to the BBC adding additional FM transmitters and to save the running costs of the MW sites. The FM frequency re-shuffle took place from 1986 - 1988.

Not to mention the BBC locals on MW that turned into the Asian Network in the East & West Midlands.
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Old 16-11-2010, 09:52
Rossall
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Possibly to save money if the audience was covered adequately on FM?

The likes of Cumbria, Devon and Cornwall need MW to fill in gaps in FM coverage whereas the likes of West Midlands don't.

I believe Radio Merseyside kept their medium wave transmitter as they had a particularly large number of listeners, particularly in North Wales who preferred medium wave and/or couldn't pick up 95.8.
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Old 16-11-2010, 10:07
belleville1
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No-one's mentioned GMR on 1458 in Manchester - which became Fortune, Lite, Capital Gold and now just Gold.
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Old 16-11-2010, 11:32
Radio_insider
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The whole move was Government led to free up spectrum for the expanding commercial local radio. The call was to end simulcasting .... At the time you saw the roll out of the "Sallies" by the IBA.

Thus pressure came on BBC stations in metropolitan areas where commercial companies wanted a frequency. Equally Heritage ILR had to provide the extra AM services. Thus the creation of Capital and Capital Gold after a Use it or lose it message from regulators.

Some BBC stations defended their AM frequencies with just cause (eg Cumbria) as they needed them to reach their audience.

As with all these things another process starts before the first one is complete .. so you do get oddities in who has what in the current day

Sadly for listeners some of the AM stations couldn't make it pay .. and either closed or jumped ship to FM when allowed to do so.
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Old 16-11-2010, 13:06
N.Dean
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1107kHz was taken fron Radio Northampton and used by Talk Radio UK. No new FM transmitters were installed to replace the lost coverage.
Radio Oxford's 1485kHz is now used by Gold in west Berkshire. Radio Oxford's FM coverage is greater than MW was.
Radio Gloucestershire's 603kHz is now unused. 1413kHz uses two transmitter sites, so there is a mush zone in the middle.
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Old 16-11-2010, 13:11
PhilipS
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BBC Radio Gloucestershire 603 kHz, now 1413 only
BBC Hereford & Worcester 819 kHz (used for Hereford)
These two were even more complex - Gloucestershire was on 603 county-wide (more or less), then went FM only when 603 was handed to the new Cheltenham ILR (CD 603 IIRC). FM from Churchdown Hill is pretty rubbish in the northeast and in the Forest, so two lower power transmitters were opened again on 1413. Meanwhile the commercial station pushed off to FM leaving the old (and better) AM channel vacant.

Hereford and Worcester had two good AM channels, co-sited with Wyvern. The 738 Worcester channel actually covers quite a bit of Herefordshire, so I guess they thought they could do without the 819 service. The 738 transmitter then moved closer to Worcester, which may or may not have had something to do with Hereford and Worcester taking over the Woofferton 1548 transmitter from Shropshire (it is actually in Shropshire, but only by a few hundred yards or so). That covers the northwest of Herefordshire.

Of course this is Sunshine 855 territory, so perhaps AM isn't quite as dead in the Marches as it is elsewhere.
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Old 16-11-2010, 17:29
allan66
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it was the inital intention to advertise a Cumbria Wide ILR licence on "AM" in the late 80s, using the frequencies of Radio Cumbria. Why this was to be done I did'nt understand as "AM" frequencies were already cleared for this purpose back in 1984!

However the beeb fought damned hard to keep the frequencies due to the poor terrain and back then Radio Cumbria was only available to a small part of the county on a decent FM signal.
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Old 16-11-2010, 17:58
Powerplay
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These two were even more complex - Gloucestershire was on 603 county-wide (more or less), then went FM only when 603 was handed to the new Cheltenham ILR (CD 603 IIRC). FM from Churchdown Hill is pretty rubbish in the northeast and in the Forest, so two lower power transmitters were opened again on 1413. Meanwhile the commercial station pushed off to FM leaving the old (and better) AM channel vacant.

Hereford and Worcester had two good AM channels, co-sited with Wyvern. The 738 Worcester channel actually covers quite a bit of Herefordshire, so I guess they thought they could do without the 819 service. The 738 transmitter then moved closer to Worcester, which may or may not have had something to do with Hereford and Worcester taking over the Woofferton 1548 transmitter from Shropshire (it is actually in Shropshire, but only by a few hundred yards or so). That covers the northwest of Herefordshire.

Of course this is Sunshine 855 territory, so perhaps AM isn't quite as dead in the Marches as it is elsewhere.
I remember when most of that was going on, I never knew that 738 in Worcestershire had moved site though, I always used to get them clear as a bell in the daytime when I lived near Milton Keynes, using my MW loop!
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Old 16-11-2010, 19:18
SteveBentley
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BBC Radio London/GLR lost its AM frequency as well.
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Old 16-11-2010, 19:33
wirewolf
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No-one's mentioned GMR on 1458 in Manchester - which became Fortune, Lite, Capital Gold and now just Gold.
It was Fortune 1458, Lite AM, Big AM, Capital Gold and now Gold. Lite AM ended up being completely automated from Wish FM at Orrell, and Big AM came mostly from Stoke.
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Old 16-11-2010, 19:37
wirewolf
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Hereford and Worcester had two good AM channels, co-sited with Wyvern. The 738 Worcester channel actually covers quite a bit of Herefordshire, so I guess they thought they could do without the 819 service. The 738 transmitter then moved closer to Worcester, which may or may not have had something to do with Hereford and Worcester taking over the Woofferton 1548 transmitter from Shropshire (it is actually in Shropshire, but only by a few hundred yards or so). That covers the northwest of Herefordshire.

Of course this is Sunshine 855 territory, so perhaps AM isn't quite as dead in the Marches as it is elsewhere.
Sunshine was originally going to be on 819, but I think they moved it to 855 due to possible interference from somewhere else. When I lived in Crewe you could just about pick up Sunshine but it clashed with R.Lancashire on the same frequency. Not like when they were on 1017 back in the pirate days - that came blasting through.
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Old 17-11-2010, 09:13
skeptical
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The whole move was Government led to free up spectrum for the expanding commercial local radio. The call was to end simulcasting .... At the time you saw the roll out of the "Sallies" by the IBA.

Thus pressure came on BBC stations in metropolitan areas where commercial companies wanted a frequency. Equally Heritage ILR had to provide the extra AM services. Thus the creation of Capital and Capital Gold after a Use it or lose it message from regulators.

Some BBC stations defended their AM frequencies with just cause (eg Cumbria) as they needed them to reach their audience.

As with all these things another process starts before the first one is complete .. so you do get oddities in who has what in the current day

Sadly for listeners some of the AM stations couldn't make it pay .. and either closed or jumped ship to FM when allowed to do so.
Many thanks for this useful information. It correlates with the fact that the transmitter at North Stockton broadcast BBC Radio Cleveland on 194m, BBC Radio 4 on 285m (up to Nov 1978) and Radio Tees on 257m.

http://tx.mb21.co.uk/gallery/stockton.php

By the mid-90s this medium wave transmitter was all commercial and both BBC stations had relinquished their frequencies. Magic 1170 (0.32kW), Talksport (1053kHz/1kW) and Absolute (1242kHz/1kW) now broadcast from this site (the latter two are fillers only).
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Old 17-11-2010, 10:48
Martin Phillp
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BBC Radio London/GLR lost its AM frequency as well.
To Sunrise Radio.

Radio Kent's 1035 frequency was lost for another commercial service in London. Country 1035 (and so many rebrands) which is now Kismat Radio.
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Old 17-11-2010, 10:52
Rob793
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BBC Radio Kent 1035 kHz (was the Medway service)
BBC Radio Nottingham 1521 kHz
1035 was used for Country 1035 in London, now Kismat.

I think 1521 was intended for an ILR licence in Chesterfield. When finally advertised years later, Peak launched on FM.
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Old 17-11-2010, 10:58
Ennerjee
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I live in London and the only way I can listen to BBC Essex on the radio is on the 765kHz. It has another AM frequency in addition to the FM coverage, so it fairs quite well in terms of availability.
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Old 17-11-2010, 12:00
Martin Phillp
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I live in London and the only way I can listen to BBC Essex on the radio is on the 765kHz. It has another AM frequency in addition to the FM coverage, so it fairs quite well in terms of availability.
765 is solid in South London during daylight hours. 95.3 works here as long as our pirate friends are off.
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Old 17-11-2010, 12:27
skeptical
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it was the inital intention to advertise a Cumbria Wide ILR licence on "AM" in the late 80s, using the frequencies of Radio Cumbria. Why this was to be done I did'nt understand as "AM" frequencies were already cleared for this purpose back in 1984!

However the beeb fought damned hard to keep the frequencies due to the poor terrain and back then Radio Cumbria was only available to a small part of the county on a decent FM signal.
I have never quite understood why local commercial radio in Cumbria is so fragmented, and why there is no medium wave service at all. If medium waves are to have a future, then it must be in difficult areas of mountainous terrain such as the Lake District and the Pennines (the latter already has Fresh Radio, of course on 936kHz with fillers).

Around the Borders, Carlisle, Cockermouth, Whitehaven, Workington and the Eden Valley there is CFM, whose music is to a large extent youth orienated (with unusually some oldies unlike most Bauer FM stations -- due to the lack of an AM 'gold' service emanating from Carlisle).

In the south there is Bay Radio, again largely youth orientated, and around Kendal and Windermere there is Lakeland Radio which falls far short of serving the Lake District as a whole. The Central and Western Lake District and the area around Keswick are particularly poorly served.

On our many enjoyable holidays in the Lake District I have often tuned in to Magic 999 from Preston in the valleys and in the west. It doesn't have a brilliant signal in Cumbria, but it's usable when you're desperate! Why there is a gap in ILR on medium wave in Cumbria I don't know... it has probably something to do with the less than organised way commercial radio has been allowed to develop in the UK.
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Old 17-11-2010, 18:11
allan66
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I have never quite understood why local commercial radio in Cumbria is so fragmented, and why there is no medium wave service at all. If medium waves are to have a future, then it must be in difficult areas of mountainous terrain such as the Lake District and the Pennines (the latter already has Fresh Radio, of course on 936kHz with fillers).

Around the Borders, Carlisle, Cockermouth, Whitehaven, Workington and the Eden Valley there is CFM, whose music is to a large extent youth orienated (with unusually some oldies unlike most Bauer FM stations -- due to the lack of an AM 'gold' service emanating from Carlisle).

In the south there is Bay Radio, again largely youth orientated, and around Kendal and Windermere there is Lakeland Radio which falls far short of serving the Lake District as a whole. The Central and Western Lake District and the area around Keswick are particularly poorly served.

On our many enjoyable holidays in the Lake District I have often tuned in to Magic 999 from Preston in the valleys and in the west. It doesn't have a brilliant signal in Cumbria, but it's usable when you're desperate! Why there is a gap in ILR on medium wave in Cumbria I don't know... it has probably something to do with the less than organised way commercial radio has been allowed to develop in the UK.
there is a seperate thread going about the above. I'm one person who thinks that a "AM" service in Cumbria, especially in West Cumbria could still work (aimed at the right audience/age group) not currently catered for. CFM has constant high ratings with the younger audience but a large audience goes without (apart from Radio2). As mentioned again in a previous thread, 1kw on already cleared 1566AM from the Whitehaven transmitter on a trial period from OFCOM and i'm confident a viable commercial operation.
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Old 17-11-2010, 22:14
smorris
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As mentioned again in a previous thread, 1kw on already cleared 1566AM from the Whitehaven transmitter on a trial period from OFCOM and i'm confident a viable commercial operation.
But in that area cheaper-to-run FM frequencies must be available. Building an AM transmitter mast is expensive (not to mention issues of planning permission).

Sure, Cumbria is hilly, but it wouldn't need nearly as many transmitters as NECR in Aberdeenshire.
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Old 17-11-2010, 23:34
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WM lost its AM frequency on 828 to the BBC Asian Network. Presumably the same happened to BBC Radio Leicester.
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Old 18-11-2010, 00:18
sparry
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1035 was used for Country 1035 in London, now Kismat.

I think 1521 was intended for an ILR licence in Chesterfield. When finally advertised years later, Peak launched on FM.
I seem to recall that bidders were given the choice of whether they wanted to use FM or AM. The same is true of when the licence for Buxton was advertised (which went to High Peak Radio). Seem to remember 1521 being mentioned then as well!
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Old 18-11-2010, 00:22
sparry
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WM lost its AM frequency on 828 to the BBC Asian Network. Presumably the same happened to BBC Radio Leicester.
Yes, after many years of broadcasting Asian output in the evenings on the medium wave, the full time BBC Asian Network launched in November 1996 on BBC Radio WM's and Leicester's former medium wave frequencies.

We had already had 24 hour Asian radio in Leicester since 1992 on 1260khz, the former Leicester Sound AM frequency, when Sunrise East Midlands launched (replacing the gold service GEM AM, which continued on 945 in Derby and 999 in Nottingham). Sunrise then lost the AM licence when it was readvertised in 1993 and Sabras Sound took over on 7th September 1995.
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Old 18-11-2010, 00:54
skeptical
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But in that area cheaper-to-run FM frequencies must be available. Building an AM transmitter mast is expensive (not to mention issues of planning permission).

Sure, Cumbria is hilly, but it wouldn't need nearly as many transmitters as NECR in Aberdeenshire.
Anorak as I am, I've driven past an already existing medium wave transmitter at Whitehaven that currently broadcasts 5 Live on 909kHz and BBC Radio Cumbria on 1458kHz. It's down in a slight valley, just off the main road as you drive towards the harbour.

http://tx.mb21.co.uk/gallery/whitehaven-am.php

Such a site would provide a decent signal for Whitehaven, Workington, Egremont, Seascale, Cockermouth, possibly Keswick and certainly large parts of the Westen Lake District.
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Old 18-11-2010, 14:35
allan66
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Anorak as I am, I've driven past an already existing medium wave transmitter at Whitehaven that currently broadcasts 5 Live on 909kHz and BBC Radio Cumbria on 1458kHz. It's down in a slight valley, just off the main road as you drive towards the harbour.

http://tx.mb21.co.uk/gallery/whitehaven-am.php

Such a site would provide a decent signal for Whitehaven, Workington, Egremont, Seascale, Cockermouth, possibly Keswick and certainly large parts of the Westen Lake District.
True. there is room on the mast as well. It used to also transmit Radio 1 on 1089kHz but it was never used again from the site when Talkradio began. The current 1kW coverage of 5Live from Whitehaven does cover as far North as Maryport and extends South to Millom!! So 1kW for commercial use would give excellent coverage.
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