• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Is AM Already Doomed? Or Can It Be Saved?

DavidEduardo said:
I wonder what the chance of giving translators permanence might be?
Click to expand...

Seems like the next logical step. As said above, a good chunk of AMs exist mostly to feed an FM translator tied to it.

According to this post by Michi and a quick search at the FCC shows almost 1,500* FM translators bound to AMs. I'm not sure if there were multiple FM translators granted for each station but my memory says it was one per station. That's also not even taking into account the unbound translators that would likely go for the same deal. I'd imagine there is at least 1,500 AM stations that would go away tomorrow if they had a permanent landing spot on FM. Probably more.

*Edit: My original search turned up 3,000 FM translators but there were many duplicate stations and cancelled licenses.
 
Last edited:
michael hagerty said:
I had forgotten KUAZ was an AM daytimer (they also have two FMs, a news station and a classical station). I mean, good for them, but...the AM simulcasts the NPR news from the FM. I don't know how they think this is worth the expense.
Click to expand...
It's a strict daytimer - no PSRA, no PSSA, originally obtained as a donation back in the late 1960s. Possibly they are considering separate service for the AM, at least part of the time, similar to what Wisconsin and Iowa do. That's just speculation on my part.

By the way, Phoenix's KJZZ has a translator in Tucson but you can't get it in the foothills.

Edit: KUAZ-FM runs a fulltime jazz service on HD2. It would seem odd to put that on AM but....?

2nd edit: KUAZ (AM and FM) broadcast jazz 9 am-3 pm until 2003 when they went to the all-information format. Again, not sure why they´d want to revive this 20 years later on a non-HD service but it may set some context.
 
Last edited:
DavidEduardo said:
Half are "dead station transmitting" and maintained only to allow an FM translator
Click to expand...
Finally getting some free time in Denver late this afternoon, I gritted my teeth to brace myself for the severe data compression and listened to the HD AM nostalgia-ish format of KLVZ at 810. Guess what they call themselves on the air? "Legends 95.3" (K232FK).
 
michael hagerty said:
I'll say this, though---and I kinda already did---if those stations did a serious analysis of how much profit they might clear over 20 years running on an FM translator versus cashing in the tower land and walking away, I'm betting all but the guys whose dream has been to own a radio station no matter what would take the money and run.
Click to expand...
Slightly related, I’ve heard for about 40 years that daily newspapers would die due to A) first tv news and B) later the Internet. While many newspapers have shut down, to
My knowledge nearly every top 100 US metro area has 1 or more daily papers. I assume most remaining newspapers make some money, but some might make more by selling any buildings they use to house the newspaper.
 
ILOVERADIO said:
My knowledge nearly every top 100 US metro area has 1 or more daily papers. I assume most remaining newspapers make some money, but some might make more by selling any buildings they use to house the newspaper.
Click to expand...
Some don't print any more, some print only certain days of the week. Many are losing money, but trying to transition to online local paper status. Many have consolidated printing in regional press facilities within a few hour's drive of the market and only have a rental office in the paper's hometown any more.
 
ILOVERADIO said:
Slightly related, I’ve heard for about 40 years that daily newspapers would die due to A) first tv news and B) later the Internet. While many newspapers have shut down, to
My knowledge nearly every top 100 US metro area has 1 or more daily papers. I assume most remaining newspapers make some money, but some might make more by selling any buildings they use to house the newspaper.
Click to expand...
The newspaper world is grim and building sales happened at a lot of them already. Printing has been outsourced. The Los Angeles Times moved to El Segundo five years ago, The San Diego Union-Tribune sold its building in 2015, and The Sacramento Bee sold its facility six years ago.

Of the major California dailies, only the San Francisco Chronicle is in its longtime home.

These sales produced cash, but also reflected an ability to downsize because of shrunken staffs. They’re not shrinking into profitability. They’re all still struggling, and the Union-Tribune was sold this week to a hedge fund that buys up newspapers and bleeds them dry (Alden Capital).
 
michael hagerty said:
Of the major California dailies, only the San Francisco Chronicle is in its longtime home.
Click to expand...
Our local paper, the Desert Sun, is down over 75% in circulation in the last 20 years. They had a beautiful landscaped building with state-of-the-art computer driven presses. Now they print in Phoenix and one truck drives in all the copies they need. All the street sales boxes are gone, and many markets and drugstores do not carry it any more. One of the local TV stations has better coverage of breaking news and actually has better writing!
 
As someone who had to design a newspaper layout by hand in high school (I’m probably one of the few people in their 30s who learned how to do that, as well as how to use carts, DATs and reels at a radio station - and even at that point I was transferring spots to MP3 with Software Audio Workshop) and worked for the student paper in college, I really wish that there was a way for papers to be profitable but it seems like more and more are going to a nonprofit model, such as the Texas Tribune, because the writing has been on the wall since Craigslist was developed around 20 years ago and ate into the classified advertising pie slowly but surely.
 
inari said:
Seems like the next logical step. As said above, a good chunk of AMs exist mostly to feed an FM translator tied to it.

According to this post by Michi and a quick search at the FCC shows almost 1,500* FM translators bound to AMs. I'm not sure if there were multiple FM translators granted for each station but my memory says it was one per station. That's also not even taking into account the unbound translators that would likely go for the same deal. I'd imagine there is at least 1,500 AM stations that would go away tomorrow if they had a permanent landing spot on FM. Probably more.

*Edit: My original search turned up 3,000 FM translators but there were many duplicate stations and cancelled licenses.
Click to expand...
A local AM station has two translators on the same tower, while a far-more-profitable AM also has two translators, which are on two towers approximately 25 miles apart.
 
ILOVERADIO said:
Slightly related, I’ve heard for about 40 years that daily newspapers would die due to A) first tv news and B) later the Internet. While many newspapers have shut down, to
My knowledge nearly every top 100 US metro area has 1 or more daily papers. I assume most remaining newspapers make some money, but some might make more by selling any buildings they use to house the newspaper.
Click to expand...
A lot of these papers, like a lot of radio stations, are full of syndicated content. My hometown still has an independent paper, but a lot of towns these days have papers that are full of generic movie reviews and car reviews and puzzle pages and comics, a whole bunch of national and world news, and a page or two of news which may be from the vague region on a good day put together by 1-2 staff.

The income they still get comes largely from old people who've always subscribed since the days when it was a bustling local newsroom and can't be bothered to cancel. I genuinely can't see anyone actually wanting to go out and spend money on these papers in a store.
 
The thing about the theory of switching to FM translators and abandoning AM is the viable sales-theoretical coverage zone would likely collapse in size with a listenable signal during the day, to the point where selling in that zone likely would be unsustainable from a business perspective.
 
Kelly A said:
The thing about the theory of switching to FM translators and abandoning AM is the viable sales-theoretical coverage zone would likely collapse in size with a listenable signal during the day, to the point where selling in that zone likely would be unsustainable from a business perspective.
Click to expand...

Which again is why I say a comparison of what you're likely to clear in profit from an FM translator over the next 20 years versus cashing out the land and heading for the beach would probably result in a lot of signoffs in a short period of time.
 
DavidEduardo said:
But if the AMs with linked translators were allowed to keep the FM and turn off the AM, I think we would lose 40% to 50% of all AMs in the first week.
Click to expand...
They will regret it the first summer day when tropo kicks in and makes their wimpy FM translator(s) unlistenable.

There's an AM with two FM translators that are normally receivable in my area, but this morning, interference from tropo made both FM signals completely unlistenable, so I switched to AM and it came in just fine.

And as we squeeze more FM signals onto the band, this will only get worse.
 
kevtronics said:
They will regret it the first summer day when tropo kicks in and makes their wimpy FM translator(s) unlistenable.

There's an AM with two FM translators that are normally receivable in my area, but this morning, interference from tropo made both FM signals completely unlistenable, so I switched to AM and it came in just fine.

And as we squeeze more FM signals onto the band, this will only get worse.
Click to expand...

The answer to that being sell the AM land, take the FM translators dark and de-clutter the FM band.

I'm really not a big fan of transitioning every AM that has an FM translator to full-time status. A ton of them are marginal operations that have limited survival chances beyond the next decade. Not arguing for driving anyone out of business, but it'd be great if those guys with the roughest roads ahead saw the upside in selling the tower land and taking both frequencies dark.
 
DavidEduardo said:
Our local paper, the Desert Sun, is down over 75% in circulation in the last 20 years. They had a beautiful landscaped building with state-of-the-art computer driven presses. Now they print in Phoenix and one truck drives in all the copies they need. All the street sales boxes are gone, and many markets and drugstores do not carry it any more. One of the local TV stations has better coverage of breaking news and actually has better writing!
Click to expand...
A TV station with better writing than a newspaper? The apocalypse now must surely be upon us!
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom