94.7 WFME sold to ESPN

[badjef]

I have been able to pickup WFME weak but listenable as far south as Exit 58 on the GSP (Tuckerton Exit).....None of the other NYC FM's have a listenable signal that far south

Atlantic county starts coming into play with the New Yorkers the further south you go. That was not always the case. In years past, before the FCC found their shoehorn for Atlantic and Cape May Counties, the Baltimore and Washington stations would interfere.

You can only go so far south and then it won't make any difference what they do in New York to try to improve the southern reception, you are still going to be dealing with co-channel.

The best you can do is try to improve the building penetration, nearby.

Now, if the Philly, Washinton, Baltimore, and Atlantic City area were to lose power, your reception would be much further than Tuckerton.

I was able to pickup 104.3 in Atlantic City, years ago. Now, that would be very difficult due to front end overload.

The power from all of these signals is there, it is just overrun by an over zealous FCC allocations office.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

I still can get many NYC stations in AC, but it takes slight tropo or I'd have to be in a north-facing room on the upper floors of a hotel.

I was able to pick up the old WQXR on 96.3 in an airplane over the Chesapeake Bay. In a plane, you have the vector from all kinds of stations that you would not be able to hit from closer to the ground.

Even the TV stations use to have signals in Pennsylvania. I know someone who used an old mattress spring for WNBC-TV in the Scranton area.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[davideduardo]

WFME transmits with 37-kw from half the height above Mean Sea Level of the Empire State Building transmitters, which use much less power, usually down around 6-kw. Its signal in most of North and Central Jersey is better than ESB signals. There is no reason it should need booster's in New Jersey.

The only figure of significance for an FM is height above average terrain, not AMSL.

WFME is a B adjusted for about 600 feet while the ESB stations are B's adjusted for 1200 feet of elevation over average terrain.

Anecdotally, I had an FM that was at about 9800 feet AMSL. The only problem was that such elevation indicated that I had an antenna 40 feet above the roof of a two-story building, and it covered very little. When I moved to about 13,000 feet, then I had coverage. Again, HAAT is important, height above sea level is not.

 

[fybush]

HAAT can be deceptive, too, though. What's more important for the Mount Wilson stations - that they're a few thousand feet lower than the San Gabriel peaks around them, resulting in HAAT figures of ~3000 feet, or that they're 5700 feet above the LA basin where all the population is?

In the case of NYC-area stations, of course, HAAT and AMSL figures tend to be nearly identical, which is what you get when you start from sea level...

 

[davideduardo]

HAAT can be deceptive, too, though. What's more important for the Mount Wilson stations - that they're a few thousand feet lower than the San Gabriel peaks around them, resulting in HAAT figures of ~3000 feet, or that they're 5700 feet above the LA basin where all the population is?

The classic one is LA's KSSE, which operates as a fairly conventional Class A from about 3000 feet over the basin. Because the HAAT is, as the second "A" indicates, an average, the negative heights over about a 150 degree arc allow that A, without power reduction, to be three kilofeet above the LA market and, effectively, almost as good a signal as 100.3 or, gasp, KIIS FM.

Yet KSSE appears, as a facility, to be 6 kw at -43 feet HAAT. Yet from the site, you can occasionally just see the tip of Catalina on the horizon. And you can see nearly all that matters in the LA population center.

It makes me wonder if the original concept of HAAT just did not contemplate places in the US where terrain variations of 5,000 feet or more could occur in just a couple of miles.

Taking that thought one step further, if Maj. Armstong had tested FM from Mt Wilson or Zandia Peak or in Denver instead of the gentle rolling hills of Alpine, might he have determined that vertical polarization was better for multipath than horizontal?

Of course, the classic sea level markets are in Florida, where much of the state has nothing higher than a curbstone.

 

[TimeIsTight]

The only figure of significance for an FM is height above average terrain, not AMSL.

While that is true, in the NYC area east of the mountain, 800 feet above sea level, on which the WFME transmitter is located, height above average terrain, and height above Mean Sea Level are pretty close to the same thing. It's not absolutely as flat as Miami, but it's close enough.

If you stand near the cluster of transmitters on that mountain on a clear day, you can directly see almost the entire NYC radio market that lies to the east. To the right you can see all the way over Staten Island to the Jersey Shore, and you can see most of Brooklyn across the big bridge. Straight ahead you can see the Manhattan skyline, and it's very easy to see the jets in the landing patterns for both JFK and Laguardia out in Queens on the other side of Manhattan. And to the left you can see all the way up into the Bronx and Westchester past the George Washington Bridge.

And with a good set of binoculars you can pick out very recognizable local landmarks all over the NYC radio market. If you can see it from there, the WFME 37-kw signal should be receivable in those spots, and in many places it is stronger than the 6-kw ESB signals.

The WFME signal to the west, north and south within the NY Radio Market in New Jersey is stronger than any ESB signal even though there are mountains to the west that are higher. WDHA's transmitter is on a mountain, 15-miles West of WFME, is 1,100 feet above MSL.

The bottom line is, that WFME has a strong 37-kw signal from 800-feet above MSL, with nothing in the way in most of the NYC area, while comparable ESB FM signals are 6-kw from 1,400-feet. In much of the NYC radio market, that extra signal power can actually be an advantage.

 

[fybush]

It makes me wonder if the original concept of HAAT just did not contemplate places in the US where terrain variations of 5,000 feet or more could occur in just a couple of miles.

It once did - sort of. Remember the "Denver waiver" that some of the Cs on Outlook once routinely received, allowing them to ignore the unpopulated Rocky Mountain peaks to the west in order to continue to claim HAATs that were high enough to retain full C status?

 

[JustPastBuffalo]

The Jets are likely to remain the only NFL team whose flagship radio station is a directional AM! Even Tim Tebow can't change that!

The Buffalo Bills (market 54) will also be on a directional, albeit a DA-N, next season. The team just moved from a Cumulus heritage Classic Rock FM to Entercom's Sports Talk WGR (where Craig Carton began his commercial radio career.) WGR on 550 has a huge 5 kW daytime omni that reaches Cleveland, Toronto and Rochester. Unfortunately, the DA-N pulls cuts the signal to the southwest and east. At night, the station comes in better in Toronto (pop 6 million+, zero US diaries) than the eastern suburbs, where the diaries are placed.

 

[davideduardo]

WGR on 550 has a huge 5 kW daytime omni that reaches Cleveland, Toronto and Rochester.

The usable daytime signal in metro areas for in home and at work listening is somewhere in the vicinity of 10 mv/m; beyond that, while you can "hear" a station, listeners will not use it save rare exceptions.

WGR's 10 mV/m covers all the home county, much of Niagara County, and tidbits of Chautauqua, Cattaragus, Wyoming and Genesee counties. It sure does not put a good enough signal into Erie or Cleveland to even be considered as an option. Toronto gets a bit over a 2 mV/m at the lakeshore, and about a 1.5 in the northern parts of the metro. Definitely not enough to generate listening.

 

[davideduardo]

If you stand near the cluster of transmitters on that mountain on a clear day, you can directly see almost the entire NYC radio market that lies to the east. To the right you can see all the way over Staten Island to the Jersey Shore, and you can see most of Brooklyn across the big bridge. Straight ahead you can see the Manhattan skyline, and it's very easy to see the jets in the landing patterns for both JFK and Laguardia out in Queens on the other side of Manhattan.

But you can't see street level at La Guardia... and most listening happens close to street level. One thing is to see the skyline, another is to be able to get inside buildings the first thirty feet or so above ground.

The high density of apartments with lots of rebar, steel beams, pipes, wiring, foil-wrapped insulation and solid exterior walls means it takes a pretty good signal to penetrate.

While there indeed is a case of diminishing returns when height is traded for power, the advantages of being at the tallest point (at least for the next few weeks) in the metro "looking down" at the listeners vs. way to the western side of the metro beaming across to them should be obvious.

 

[TimeIsTight]

But you can't see street level at La Guardia... and most listening happens close to street level.

The only reason you can't see down to street level is the tall Manhattan buildings in the middle, and at that distance, either way, the tall buildings don't have the blocking impact on a VHF radio signal that they have on visible light.

The WFME transmitter site is just under 15-miles west of the ESB, and La Guardia is about seven-miles east of ESB.

The Queens,NY zip code farthest east, at the Nassau County border, is in the Glen Oaks neighborhood. It is 15-miles from the ESB, and 29-miles from WFME's transmitter. The reported signal strength (dBuV/m) for ESB Class-B FMs in that Zip is 76.4, and WFME's is a still good 65.1.

I am not disputing that in that direction farther out on Long Island the WFME signal drops off 10-or-15-miles sooner than the ESB signals. That is its main flaw in comparison to ESB signals. But the point I have been trying to make, is that it hardly makes the station completely "undesirable" as a NY market radio signal. No doubt, it is worth less than an ESB signal, and in some areas to the east, it also lacks the same punch to get through buildings as an ESB signal at a higher angle.

Still, it is the only NY Market FM currently "for sale" and it may be a while before then next one comes on the market. The question is: How many potential buyers will be willing to overlook its Long Island weakness in order to have a NY market signal now, and how many will be willing to wait, possibly years, for the next "perfect signal" opportunity to come along? Somebody is going to buy it. I'm expecting a major player, who sees the glass as 90% full rather than 10% empty.

(For those without access to the Arbitron database:

FM Signals by Zip: http://www.v-soft.com/ZipSignal/

http://www.fmfool.com/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29

)

 

[badjef]

Nobody is saying WFME has a bad signal. It doesn't have as competitive signal as the rest of the "20". The angle to which you refer is what I call the vector. It is the angle at which the signal reaches the radio. When it comes in from the side - as in the case with West Orange - the radio is more likely to experience multipath and that will effect the HD signal as well. If the signal is aimed down at the radio, the reverse is true. Plus, you have the added attenuation of the 94.7 signal due to the overload of the front end by the closer - and more of them - ERP's. It isn't the signal, it is the effect the other, closer, stations have on the 94.7 reception. With just the 19 commercial FM signals from Empire, they are generating an ERP of 108.6kw. So what's left of the 37kw is being squashed at the radio.

The next New York blackout and 94.7 rules the day in The City where it is.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[davideduardo]

The Queens,NY zip code farthest east, at the Nassau County border, is in the Glen Oaks neighborhood. It is 15-miles from the ESB, and 29-miles from WFME's transmitter. The reported signal strength (dBuV/m) for ESB Class-B FMs in that Zip is 76.4, and WFME's is a still good 65.1.

Bingo.

The facts, confirmed over and over year after year, show that 80% of at work and at home FM listening occurs inside the 70 dbu signal and 95% takes place inside the 65 dbu signal.

The assumption that there is really a 65 dbu signal east of Manhattan and the "wall of highrises" is risky. My anecdotal experience is trying to listen to WCAA in a hotel at 52nd and Mad, a short walk to the ESB, and not being able to hear it at all on a high end portable unless I put the radio in the window... building do attenuate signals.

In New York, where 75% of listening is not in the car, the ability to reach all of the population with a decent signal is critical. WFME reaches the western parts well. It's not at its best in the canyons of Manhattan and much of the boroughs, and certainly is not as good to the north and the east.

 

[TimeIsTight]

The angle to which you refer is what I call the vector. It is the angle at which the signal reaches the radio. When it comes in from the side - as in the case with West Orange - the radio is more likely to experience multipath and that will effect the HD signal as well. If the signal is aimed down at the radio, the reverse is true

Another way to look at the "vector" is how close to the horizon is the signal's angle? It can be easily calculated using high school geometry and a right triangle. The hypotenuse is your vector line, the height of the antenna above sea level (in this case) is one side of the right triangle, and the distance to the listener is the other.

Doing the calculations using the distances from the Glen Oaks neighborhood in Queens to the ESB and West Orange.

The "vector" angle from the top of the ESB 15-miles away is just over 1-degree above the horizon, while the vector angle for a signal from 800 feet high in West Orange, 29-miles away, is 0.36-degree. As to multipath problems etc. the difference between 1-degree and 1/3-degree don't matter much. It you were sitting on the Queens side of the East River, opposite the UN, and a mile or two from the ESB, the angle would be much steeper and it might make a difference if there were no buildings along the hypotenuse blocking the ESB view.

Plus, you have the added attenuation of the 94.7 signal due to the overload of the front end by the closer - and more of them - ERP's. It isn't the signal, it is the effect the other, closer, stations have on the 94.7 reception. With just the 19 commercial FM signals from Empire, they are generating an ERP of 108.6kw. So what's left of the 37kw is being squashed at the radio.

Again, this "signal overload" is something dependent on the close proximity of the transmitter. To be really generous, if you are more than a mile away from the transmitter it shouldn't matter. Don't forget that the intensity of the signal drops with the square of the distance.

Ironically, I drive within a few hundred feet of the 37-kw WFME transmitter every now and then, and only have a problem when I am very close, and tuned to a station near its dial position. I have DXed FM from that area and had no problem getting stations in Connecticut (like WEBE), or Westchester, or even WHYY out of Philadelphia. The transmitters at the ESB are a quarter mile up in the sky, and only 6-kw. I doubt if many people have signal overload problems from there, especially people in the outer boroughs or Jersey. If you have a reasonably selective receiver the fact that there are multiple signals wouldn't be additive either even if you were fairly close.

 

[TimeIsTight]

My anecdotal experience is trying to listen to WCAA in a hotel at 52nd and Mad, a short walk to the ESB, and not being able to hear it at all on a high end portable unless I put the radio in the window... building do attenuate signals.

Sometimes the fact that those buildings attenuate signals can be a "comforting" thing. About 20-years ago, my office was in the NY World Financial Center across the street from the World Trade Center. When you looked out the windows you could see the top of the North Tower with all the high power antennae for TV, radio, and who knows what else, up there. But if you stepped back from the windows with a top quality radio in your hand, you got only static from the lights, computers etc.

It was actually nice to know that we weren't being overly irradiated with EMF from all those nearby high power transmitters thanks to all the heavy metal that surrounded and supported us, and probably a helped little by the fact that the signals were being beamed out and not down.

The "canyons of Manhattan" can produce strange radio reception situations too. From what listeners in those neighborhoods actually told me, some NJ FMs had better signals on the east-west side streets than the NYC ESB signals. It seems the distant Jersey signals could shoot up some straight side streets from the Hudson River unencumbered, while the ESB signals were blocked by buildings to the north or south.

As far as the outer boroughs go, construction is often a mix of wood frame and brick private homes, like you might find anywhere, and steel and concrete apartment buildings. And the neighborhood can change noticeably by the block. The only way you can really tell how well a signal overcomes those challenges, and the ambient electrical noise, is to test it in each location.

In those places where the signals are noticeably attenuated, or interference is awful, it's usually an equal opportunity situation where all the stations on the band have the same problem so it really doesn't impact the competitive situation. A couple of exceptions might be the 50-kw directional AM's aimed at the city like WINS, or WNYM, which you can even hear clearly under the steel frame elevated electric railways in Brooklyn, where other stations disappear.

 

[nd2023]

My anecdotal experience is trying to listen to WCAA in a hotel at 52nd and Mad, a short walk to the ESB, and not being able to hear it at all on a high end portable unless I put the radio in the window... building do attenuate signals.

Sometimes the fact that those buildings attenuate signals can be a "comforting" thing. About 20-years ago, my office was in the NY World Financial Center across the street from the World Trade Center. When you looked out the windows you could see the top of the North Tower with all the high power antennae for TV, radio, and who knows what else, up there. But if you stepped back from the windows with a top quality radio in your hand, you got only static from the lights, computers etc.

It was actually nice to know that we weren't being overly irradiated with EMF from all those nearby high power transmitters thanks to all the heavy metal that surrounded and supported us, and probably a helped little by the fact that the signals were being beamed out and not down.

The "canyons of Manhattan" can produce strange radio reception situations too. From what listeners in those neighborhoods actually told me, some NJ FMs had better signals on the east-west side streets than the NYC ESB signals. It seems the distant Jersey signals could shoot up some straight side streets from the Hudson River unencumbered, while the ESB signals were blocked by buildings to the north or south.

As far as the outer boroughs go, construction is often a mix of wood frame and brick private homes, like you might find anywhere, and steel and concrete apartment buildings. And the neighborhood can change noticeably by the block. The only way you can really tell how well a signal overcomes those challenges, and the ambient electrical noise, is to test it in each location.

In those places where the signals are noticeably attenuated, or interference is awful, it's usually an equal opportunity situation where all the stations on the band have the same problem so it really doesn't impact the competitive situation. A couple of exceptions might be the 50-kw directional AM's aimed at the city like WINS, or WNYM, which you can even hear clearly under the steel frame elevated electric railways in Brooklyn, where other stations disappear.

It was strange how in Battery Park I could hear WPRB 103.3 almost as strong as 103.5 KTU, despite the fact that KTU has IBUZ. I couldn't see Empire, but there was only water between Battery Park and NJ. I could also pick up a trace of 93.7 WSTW from Wilmington, DE because WNYC's IBUZ was off that day. Mix 106.1 from Philly also came in.

Must have been the combination of the buildings blocking a direct path to Empire and the same buildings reflecting signals from the southwest.

 

[davideduardo]

As far as the outer boroughs go, construction is often a mix of wood frame and brick private homes, like you might find anywhere, and steel and concrete apartment buildings. And the neighborhood can change noticeably by the block. The only way you can really tell how well a signal overcomes those challenges, and the ambient electrical noise, is to test it in each location.

But, in many places the low reception angle (I like Jeff's "vector" term here) means the signal has to go through many, many houses... full of wires, pipes, and even foil covered insulation if retrofitted.

Again, the practical minimum for in-home and at-work usage is around 65 to 68 dbu... meaning that, with a degree of attenuation, signals below that level are going to be very limited options for listeners.

In those places where the signals are noticeably attenuated, or interference is awful, it's usually an equal opportunity situation where all the stations on the band have the same problem so it really doesn't impact the competitive situation.

The result there in today's world is that people will listen to web streams or stations with better signals... thus the success of "smaller" Long Island stations in the shadow of NYC stations.

The ESB stations have 65's that just ding Suffolk, get about 75% of the population of Westchester, and just get parts of Morris, Somerset and Monmouth counties. The car radio reception extends farther out, so in the suburbs the ESB stations benefit from higher in-car usage in the areas where in-home is pretty ragged.

So, WFME is at a double disadvantage for being off the center of population and, at the same time, shadowed by a high density of buildings and houses in the path to much of the population.

 

[badjef]

As far as the outer boroughs go, construction is often a mix of wood frame and brick private homes, like you might find anywhere, and steel and concrete apartment buildings. And the neighborhood can change noticeably by the block. The only way you can really tell how well a signal overcomes those challenges, and the ambient electrical noise, is to test it in each location.

But, in many places the low reception angle (I like Jeff's "vector" term here) means the signal has to go through many, many houses... full of wires, pipes, and even foil covered insulation if retrofitted.

Again, the practical minimum for in-home and at-work usage is around 65 to 68 dbu... meaning that, with a degree of attenuation, signals below that level are going to be very limited options for listeners.

In those places where the signals are noticeably attenuated, or interference is awful, it's usually an equal opportunity situation where all the stations on the band have the same problem so it really doesn't impact the competitive situation.

The result there in today's world is that people will listen to web streams or stations with better signals... thus the success of "smaller" Long Island stations in the shadow of NYC stations.

The ESB stations have 65's that just ding Suffolk, get about 75% of the population of Westchester, and just get parts of Morris, Somerset and Monmouth counties. The car radio reception extends farther out, so in the suburbs the ESB stations benefit from higher in-car usage in the areas where in-home is pretty ragged.

So, WFME is at a double disadvantage for being off the center of population and, at the same time, shadowed by a high density of buildings and houses in the path to much of the population.

At the risk of making this sound like a mutual admiration society, I think David finally hit it. WFME is off the spindle. Being 14 miles from every other signal, leaves it as the odd man out. New York is unique in as much as all of the signals originate from one center, except one. Even the little guy at 105.9 is there. The people in Essex County have signal to spare, move it to Empire, they will still have reception, but it would pick up that additional population in Queens that might have just the little more push needed.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[XCountry285]

if they're going to go with alternative or country I'd say stay in NJ. It's gonna just be a station much like DHA which is heard in most of nyc metro but not in the city as well

 

[TimeIsTight]

With all due respect, the fact that WFME is "off the spindle" should be obvious from the get-go. The New York Radio Market is essentially designed according to the reach of Class-B FM stations from the top of the ESB. Just compare a signal map to an official market map. And West Orange is 15-miles west, meaning it can't offer an equivalent signal to the east leaving the shortfall around Levittown. That was always a given.

As far as the "vectors" go, as mentioned, even in high-angle, close-proximity to the ESB, Manhattan, the signal is still blocked by buildings most of the time, and sometimes when you can "see" the ESB you can't "hear" the signal.

If you do the math, even at five miles from the ESB, the top of it will appear only 3-degrees above the horizon, and at 28-miles away WFME's signal will come in at 1/3 of a degree. Either way, that signal is going to have to plow through nearby buildings, and the FCC accounted for that difference in the math, by giving WFME 37-kw against 6-kw from the ESB.

(don't forget straight up is 90-degrees, so 3-degrees above flat, or a fraction of 1-degree is still very low, and the shadows will be about the same)

Somewhere, prospective buyers have come up with numbers to justify exactly how much less the West Orange signal is worth than a full ESB signal, and how much they are willing to pay anyway. Although the last few ESB signals sold have had their actual prices paid masked by being parts of larger and more complicated transactions, it will be interesting to see the value of the WFME signal as measured by the winning bidder. We'll probably never know how many "potential" bidders were turned off because the signal wasn't "perfect" but it's probably not a big fraction of all potential bidders.

 

[Ai4i]

An exciting thread to be sure, but I need to repeat this experience I am having in Miami Beach.
A small number of FM stations are southwest of me, beyond the third largest metropolitan skyline in the US, in Downtown Miami.
Miami Beach also has some fairly tall builtings.
Maps invariably show that WDNA, WKCP, WVUM, and WRTO have good signals here, but they are all useless with multipath in moving vehicles.
Go north on the beach or go west of downtown Miami, and most become absolutely solid.
The weakest of them in other locations sounds better in moving vehicles than the strongest in South Beach.
Due to the proximity of WFME, they will get into Manhattan more strongly than those stations in southwest Dade County get into Miami Beach, but multipath is still multipath, plus we only have two stations downtown, our major cluster of sixteen "C"s is more than a dozen miles away.