The FCC should allows operators to turn off their AMs while keeping their translators. Owners, especially the smaller ones, should not be required to waste electricity, and they should not have to pour away wasted dollars on something that does not bring in listeners or revenue to their operations.
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What the FCC should allow: Keeping only FM translators while silencing their AMs
- Thread starter Bill-in-CT
- Start date
We've had a lot of discussions about the electricity costs, and it's not as prohibitive as you think.
Also it's really unfair to other operators. AM owners knew what they were buying. They should have bought FM stations if that's what they wanted. This is basically the government giving these owners a free FM license because they happened to own an AM. Like buying a house in a ghetto, and the government giving me a house in a better neighborhood. They didn't pay for these licenses, it was a form of welfare. They took these translators knowing what the deal was. They promised to continue to operate the AM and provide the full service those stations were licenses to provide. This provides a form of windfall profit.
The FCC has no benefit here. They lose AMs at a time when the congress is trying to justify AM in every car. Licensing of translators is different, the requirements are different, and the benefits to the government are less. Plus the service area to the community is much smaller. I can see why some owners might like this, but I don't see it in the public interest. The stated purpose was AM revitalization, not AM shutdown.
Also it's really unfair to other operators. AM owners knew what they were buying. They should have bought FM stations if that's what they wanted. This is basically the government giving these owners a free FM license because they happened to own an AM. Like buying a house in a ghetto, and the government giving me a house in a better neighborhood. They didn't pay for these licenses, it was a form of welfare. They took these translators knowing what the deal was. They promised to continue to operate the AM and provide the full service those stations were licenses to provide. This provides a form of windfall profit.
The FCC has no benefit here. They lose AMs at a time when the congress is trying to justify AM in every car. Licensing of translators is different, the requirements are different, and the benefits to the government are less. Plus the service area to the community is much smaller. I can see why some owners might like this, but I don't see it in the public interest. The stated purpose was AM revitalization, not AM shutdown.
being the pedatnic outlier i love to be.... KDLG 670's power bill is $6500 a month... by lowering power to 1kw nights or going off the air 12mid to 6am, they could save around $3000 a month.. which in the face of funding cuts, they might have to.
And I'd be willing to bet that KYUK (640 kHz in Bethel), KOTZ (720 kHz in Kotzebue), KBRW (680 kHz in Barrow), and KSDP (830 kHz) in Sandpoint have the same problem. And, with the possible exceptions of KSDP and KOTZ, all of these stations also have FMs that are programmed separately from their AM counterparts. I'm guessing that it may well be that the CPB budget cuts may force all of these stations to simulcast all of whatever programming they have remaining over both their AM and FM outlets.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
In many ways, this is disingenuous as an argument. The majority -- I hesitate to say "vast majority" because I simply don't have the time to research and take an exact count -- got translators for their AMs because their night facilities were either non-existent (daytimer) or laughable (15 watts). A lot of operators only keep their AMs in service to allow the translator to operate and identify only with the FM frequency. That's not the same as serving the community on AM because they had no other options.
That said, I think any AM/translator operator who has the opportunity to acquire a full-power FM in their market should do so unless the seller has set an unreasonably high purchase price. But more often than not, as I have said in the thread about religious broadcasters, no one knows what stations are available until (surprise!) the sale to EMF or one of their brethren is announced.
How, pray tell, is someone supposed to buy a full-power station when there is no legal requirement for a competitor to make public their intent to sell one?
The fallacy there is in your last sentence, A. What happened was not "revitalization" of AM but instead a further downgrading of that service in many markets, by many operators, making AM even less "visible" as an option.
KBRW and KDLG use MDCL.. modulation dependent carrier level, that reduces power when theres no modulation. I dont think the others do.
KOTZ and KSDP have FMs that simulcast the AMS... each has one in their home village and subsequent fm repeaters in other villages.
KDLG and KOTZ's FM's are programmed seperately from the AM, as is i think KBRW's FM.. but theres not a ton of cost of time or staff involved in either one, so cutting them or simulcasting them would be duplication and not save much money at all
Theyre in the city so i believe theyre on city power.
KSKO-AM was generator powered and cost $60-70K a year to power, thats why it went away
I get that, but using the recent CPB example, why is that a government problem? Why should the government relieve AM stations of their obligations because the marketplace has changed? I can't see this FCC, given the way its chairman wants to give new emphasis to enforcing the public interest standard, is going to allow AMs to operate as translators only.
I posted many comments here ridiculing the concept of "AM revitalization," because it did nothing for the AM. The only thing revitalized was the business. But once again, everyone knew the rules when they chose to play the game.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
I agree. But after more AM licenses go permanently silent as transmitter sites are sold off for the real estate value, and the initiative for mandating AM receivers in cars proves as impotent as was the revitalization plan, sooner or later the idea of making translators a stand-alone class of service will have to be seriously discussed.
All it will take is some station owner, who we will never have heard about previously, being unable to keep their AM because of circumstances they cannot control, who will challenge the legality of the "tied together" AM/translator combinations from the "revitalization" so that they can feed the translator from a HD2 stream, and there's your chink in the armor. Once that restriction is removed (and I believe it will be) the next step will be a separate Class A0 to license translators as standalone stations.
And by then, very few people will be still championing AM.
So yes, I agree that it has the proverbial "snowball's chance in Hell" of this FCC doing it. Probably won't happen with the next two administrations' FCCs either. But a decade from now, I believe the situation will be different.
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I agree, but I don't see a winning strategy, and I don't see the FCC volunteering to do this unless its forced to.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
No argument from me there.
All it will take is one solid legal judgement against the policy and there's the "forced to".
I also believe the translators should be given "protection" of their 60 db signal and become class (A1 or A0) if the AM goes away. But the FCC will counter that class C & D's AMs who sell - lose their land are given the opportunity to file an STA to run what amounts to modified "Travel Info Equipment". That would give the FCC a really strong case against someone trying to forcing them to create class A1 or A0 FMs.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Thus far, the FCC has been very strict about compliance with the regulations about translators. I recall that case where WJLX claimed someone had stolen their tower in the dead of night (and that matter is still unresolved, actually) they filed for a STA to keep the translator in service ... and were summarily denied.
I don't see the Commission relaxing the rules in that way -- especially using a STA for that purpose -- without creating a class of service covering those stations on a long-term basis.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
I can only cite the example I gave. That is the only incident which I followed closely to see what happened, and I did so because a lot of people saw the WJLX issue as being other than accurate. It was widely reported in all of the industry news sites.
There may well have been STAs issued to keep translators on the air if their associated AM has engineering issues. But those would have flown beneath the radar and not reported in industry news sources, as was WJLX. That is the only reason I can cite that example; it is verifiable from numerous sources. It's not a hypothetical question, which is what you seem to be asking.
My real point, which you seem to have overlooked (do you have an ulterior motive in asking?) is that I do not see the FCC ever authorizing a STA for anything but a temporary authorization, whereas the poster whose question I answered seems to think that there is some kind of STA which is semi-permanent.
I know one station whos AM was crumpled by a hurricane and they asked the FCC verbally by phone for an STA to keep the translator on while they worked on a longwire set up for the AM in the next 48 to 72 hours and the FCC said no.
But then recently, an AM in the midwest had to do some kind of work on the tower that wouldve necessitated taking the am off, they got an STA to keep the translator on while the AM was off
But then recently, an AM in the midwest had to do some kind of work on the tower that wouldve necessitated taking the am off, they got an STA to keep the translator on while the AM was off
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Sounds like these are decided on a case by case basis, then, so there is no definitive answer.
Thanks for adding those, Paul.
Thanks for adding those, Paul.
In the rest of our hemisphere, we have seen a variety of reactions to the decline of AM.
Mexico declared the band "dead" and managed to move about 80% of existing AMs to FM. They would have moved more, but the FM band along the border is restricted by obsolete treaty-based second adjacent channel separation requirements.
Canada never had as many stations, so they gradually allowed the migration of many AMs to FM.
Argentina has a vibrant AM situation, with AM having nearly as much audience as FM; Argentina never licensed directional stations, daytimers or the like. Maybe that shows where the problem is: too many inferior AMs in the US to begin with.
Brazil moved AM to an expanded FM band. Only moderately successful as few are buying new radios.
The rest just let market forces kill most AMs. Many places like San Salvador, Quito, Guayaquil, Tegucigalpa, Guatemala City and Panama City have much less than half the AM stations they had 40 years ago.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Thanks for that perspective on the numerous countries south of us (and that proposed "51st state" to our north), David.
It sounds like most of the strategies that have been proposed have been tried somewhere, with mixed results. I especially appreciate knowing what happened in Brazil, as I also have significant doubts that any solution requiring the masses to buy new radios would be doomed to fail. The last thing any of us should want is giving people yet another reason to give up on us.
On one hand, I think reducing AM transmission bandwidth was a mistake, but not regulating sources of electrical interference was a bigger one. And neither can be corrected this long after the fact.
It sounds like most of the strategies that have been proposed have been tried somewhere, with mixed results. I especially appreciate knowing what happened in Brazil, as I also have significant doubts that any solution requiring the masses to buy new radios would be doomed to fail. The last thing any of us should want is giving people yet another reason to give up on us.
On one hand, I think reducing AM transmission bandwidth was a mistake, but not regulating sources of electrical interference was a bigger one. And neither can be corrected this long after the fact.