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Rogers Shuts Down Six Stations

Rogers is a telecom company. End of. At this point, they're focused on trying to get everyone on their cell service. Telecoms in Canada should never have gotten into broadcasting. The majority of ads on bell and rogers properties are to get people onto their cell plans/streaming services. In the U.S, you see tv ads for products, in Canada, they're for the parent company's services. Which explains why Canadian tv ads are so terrible.

I can see them out of radio completely in less than 10 years.

I don't believe they even tried to find a buyer for the licenses. They didn't try with the stations they shut down in the past. They usually just make a decision to shut them down, and that's always days after they purchase something else that's only sports related. They make these decisions very quick.
If you had told me when i was a teen the Calgary and Vancouver stations would be gone before I retired from the workforce, I would never have believed you.
 
Other than some sentimental attachment one might have here, I'm not sure I see the problem. Rogers is a business that wants to focus investments on where the people are. Clearly that's not AM radio. So, why continue to pour resources into it? This is not because they didn't try, it's because there is superior technology.
 
luperm said:
Other than some sentimental attachment one might have here, I'm not sure I see the problem. Rogers is a business that wants to focus investments on where the people are. Clearly that's not AM radio. So, why continue to pour resources into it? This is not because they didn't try, it's because there is superior technology.
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I am looking at this situation beyond the AM radio perspective. Sure, we can talk about how AM is dying, but let’s not forget that Rogers is in control of 104.9 in Vancouver. 104.9 has had about five different formats since the time that I started paying attention to media in Vancouver. Nothing has really worked out that well on that particular frequency.

If 1130 really was a bad frequency (on AM no less), why not explore migrating the newsradio content over to 104.9? Other media companies have done exactly this. If not completely, there’s often a FM counterpart. There are some bigger issues at play here (because technically speaking, the 104.9 frequency is a relay for a station based in Chilliwack). But still, I would imagine that Rogers would have been able to make some sort of a case to the CRTC for moving a spoken word format that serves the entire region to FM.

So in short, regardless of it being AM or FM, they see no value in local news or spoken word content in Vancouver. It seeks like a convenient way to just divest from the radio business and blame it all on the most convenient excuse they can find.
 
mimo said:
Telecoms in Canada should never have gotten into broadcasting.
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AT&T only owned one radio station. It was WEAF, 660AM in New York City. The foundation for the antenna is still on the roof of the old AT&T building on 6th avenue. But they turned over the license as part of the formation of NBC in 1926. They never returned to radio ownership.

luperm said:
This is not because they didn't try, it's because there is superior technology.
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Bell and Marconi were competitors. Marconi considered his invention to be "wireless telephony." Unfortunately, his transmitter was too big for personal use. A hundred years later, the cell phone seems to have won the battle.
 
Smartphone apps to check traffic *while* you are driving? Isn't that what the authorities call 'distracted driving'?
The poster above mentioned moving all-news to FM. I think that would be a good idea. Also, see if there can be a new FM home for the Calgary Flames...or if CHQR could become the new home.

The Calgary Herald is not pleased either:
calgaryherald.com

Shuttering of Sportsnet 960 a devastating blow for Calgary sports

The decision to shutter Sportsnet 960 The Fan leaves a huge hole in Calgary's sports landscape.
calgaryherald.com calgaryherald.com
 
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crainbebo said:
Smartphone apps to check traffic *while* you are driving? Isn't that what the authorities call 'distracted driving'?
The poster above mentioned moving all-news to FM. I think that would be a good idea. Also, see if there can be a new FM home for the Calgary Flames...or if CHQR could become the new home.
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I’m not sure I’d go as far as to say that I “recommend” moving their newsradio programming to FM, but I would certainly challenge them on this idea of just shutting it down all together. I definitely think they were looking for a low hanging fruit excuse to shut down their more complex (and expensive) programming get out of the business.

I agree on the point about using smartphones when driving. I’ve used Google Maps when driving, but I don’t think it’s a perfect substitute for actual traffic reports. I’m always impressed with KNX and KCBS when I hear their news reports. No, you don’t get in depth information about everything, but you get a good sense of what is going on and where the main issues are.
 
I thought I had found the current ratings for Toronto and Vancouver, to see how the shutdown AM's were faring in their final days, but had to delete it when I realized they were from 2014! I couldn't find a source for any current ratings. I do recall their being an issue with that information no longer being publicly released. It showed CBC 1 by far as the #1 station in Vancouver. I don't know if that still holds true.
 
crainbebo said:
Smartphone apps to check traffic *while* you are driving? Isn't that what the authorities call 'distracted driving'?
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Google Maps or Waze announce the live traffic so you don't even have to take your eyes off the road. Otherwise, glance at the screen and the traffic is shown on the map in red. Do you really not know this?

crainbebo said:
The poster above mentioned moving all-news to FM. I think that would be a good idea.
Click to expand...

So do I. Those were established all-news stations that would have almost certainly been moved to FM in any American market. It's possible CBC was too strong for Rogers to compete with in those Canadian markets, though.

crainbebo said:
Also, see if there can be a new FM home for the Calgary Flames...or if CHQR could become the new home.
Click to expand...

There will surely be a new radio home for the Flames.
 
Theater of My Mind said:
So do I. Those were established all-news stations that would have almost certainly been moved to FM in any American market. It's possible CBC was too strong for Rogers to compete with in those Canadian markets, though.
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The difference here is regulation. The (until recently) limit of two FMs per owner per market meant local clusters didn't have an obvious #3 or #4 FM to move them to. Not to mention, they would have needed to amend the license of any FM they wanted to convert to all News, Talk, or Sports.

Canada also doesn't have the same market for brokered, religious, or all-syndicated talk or sports stations, so the signals simply get shut off.
 
I guess the apps have been around for a while. I just never use them because I don't live in a major market ;) I thought most still got their traffic reports from the radio. I don't miss Seattle rush hour whatsoever, and even Boise is getting messy. I-84 is always stop and go mornings and afternoons from Nampa to the I-184 junction.
 
KilowattKat said:
I thought I had found the current ratings for Toronto and Vancouver, to see how the shutdown AM's were faring in their final days, but had to delete it when I realized they were from 2014!
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Yep. I remember Lance published Canadian ratings on RadioInsight at one time, but not any longer.

Numeris does still publish some broad statistics. They point out that radio reaches 81% of Canadians each week, and the average Canadian listens to about 7.5 hours of radio per week. Both of these are lower than the US data from Nielsen.

Further, overall radio listening (total hours) has fallen by 29% in Vancouver from 2019 to 2025, despite a rising population.

Weiserguy said:
Is it possible the Canadian government offers owners some incentive to move off AM or shutter their AMs? They may want to accelerate abandonment of the AM band. This is the same government that shut down CHU (their version of WWV, the Canadian time service on shortwave) just last week.
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Maybe, but certainly not necessary. The CRTC reported there were only 115 AMs operating in 2024, 97 in English, 4 in French, and 14 in another language.

Information archivée dans le Web | Information Archived on the Web

publications.gc.ca publications.gc.ca

A significant proportion of the English stations are run by the CBC, almost 20%.

There are several provinces with fewer AMs than you can count on one hand. Prince Edward Island has none. When I visited Nova Scotia, I don't believe the scan function on my rental car radio stopped once (daytime) and I'm not nerdy enough to scan the band manually. Almost all of the existing AMs are in large cities.
 
Theater of My Mind said:
The move also contradicts your frequent prediction that talk formats are poised to replace music on the radio. This is a big broadcaster going in the other direction.
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No, this is about admitting that AM is dead. Our other neighbor, Mexico, passed a resolution in its congress declaring such death and facilitated the move of about 80% of all stations to FM (they did that, in part, by relaxing the second adjacent channel separation to the more international standard rather than the stricter NARBA and US/Mexico treaty ones).

In Mexico, a significant number of FMs now do talk, as is the case throughout Latin America as AM disappears, station by station.
 
crainbebo said:
Smartphone apps to check traffic *while* you are driving? Isn't that what the authorities call 'distracted driving'?
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I have been with friends who used traffic apps in LA. It made me very nervous, to say the least.

I can only hope that those systems will evolve into an app integrated into dashboard systems that guides the driver on the big car screen.
 
davideduardo said:
I have been with friends who used traffic apps in LA. It made me very nervous, to say the least.

I can only hope that those systems will evolve into an app integrated into dashboard systems that guides the driver on the big car screen.
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I just use my car’s built in navigation. I rarely take freeways, they’re too crowded.
 
davideduardo said:
Not as well as the apps, that guide you minute by minute, verbally, to alternative routes.
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David, your phone connects to your car's entertainment system via Apple Carplay or Android Auto, depending on what kind of phone you have.

The navigation apps on your phone, such as Google Maps and Waze, will then get mirrored onto your car's built-in touchscreen and the verbal directions will play through your car's speakers, ducking the music temporarily when it makes the announcements. This is exactly the feature you said you'd like to have. Well, you already have it.

You'll also have access to most of the entertainment apps on your phone, such as Spotify, iHeart, TuneIn, Pandora, etc., which will play through your car speakers and can be controlled through your car's "big screen." You can make hands-free phone calls and your notifications can also be set to pop up on your screen.

This is the technology the younger generations use in their cars, and one of the reasons AM/FM radio has become so much less relevant. Once you've set up the phone connection -- especially if the car supports it wirelessly -- the phone reconnects automatically whenever you get in and resumes playing the last thing you were listening to. No need to turn on the radio. Your navigation app automatically appears on your screen ready for you you to enter, or speak, your destination. You don't even need to look at your phone. It can stay in your pocket or in a cubby in the car. Everything works seamlessly.

IIRC you drive a BMW so here's how to set it up in your car:

Apple:

BMW Apple CarPlay: Available Models & Setup Guide | BMW of Mountain View

www.bmwofmountainview.com www.bmwofmountainview.com

Android:

BMW Android Auto: Compatible Models & Setup Guide | BMW of Mountain View

www.bmwofmountainview.com www.bmwofmountainview.com
 
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