Class D FM stations

[JakeLongwell]

Last week, we lost another class D FM signal. The FCC deleted the license of WCEB at Corning Community College in upstate New York. The station had failed to renew its license when the time came, mainly due to the fact the person(s) running the station did not understand the proper procedure for renewal.

The loss of WCEB got me to thinking. Hence the reason for this post.

Is anyone on this board involved wiht a class D educational station? If so, how active is your station? Is there much interest in the station among students and/or community volunteers?

It seems we are losing more class D FM stations in recent years. I know most are being replaced wiht webcasts and such. I just hope we don't lose all of the class D signals. They are unique in their own right. The southern tier still has one lone class D signal on the air. I hope they can remain on air for years to come.

 

[RadioMan203]

I hate to say it but I would guess over time they will look to get rid of all of the Class D signals. If I recall correctly one of the colleges near me had a Class D and because the administration couldn't get past the esthetics of mounting the antenna on a campus building the station had gone silent. I don't know with any certainty if this is what the outcome was but I do remember it being a hot button of discussion.

I know there are quite a few colleges and universities who had gone with campus-limited radio as well as webcasting as I had been contacted more than once during the past year in inquiries. While an campus-limited signal may not get out as far as a Class D signal can at least it still allows students to learn the principles involved in broadcasting.

 

[nd2023]

My former high school station is a class D station, operating with 10 watts and licensed for 17. It's been on the air for over 30 years and as long as the same teacher stays till 2014, the license will be renewed. It could have upgraded to 100 watts in the 90s, but for some reason, it didn't. The signal goes at most 5 miles. It serves the community much more than any commercial station.

 

[johnbasalla]

Back in the late 1970s, the FCC made a move against the really small licensed broadcasters with 10-watt signals saying, at least in big markets, that the new minimum is 100 watts. If you chose to stay at 10 watts then you had to accept interference from newly licensed bigger facilities in or around your frequency. You can thank NPR/CPB for this as they were big on trying to get all the small college stations off the air so they can grow their signals. Nice monopoly thinking. That being said, they and the FCC had a point. Some stations were such low-brow operations that they weren't serving anyone really. Frankly I can't shed a tear for an owner or operators who walk around clueless and do nothing to make sure they know the most basic rules and needs. If they don't know about license renewals at all, there's a good chance that they are also not up-to-date on other key items like EAS (Emergency Alert System). They'd be the type of station that when there's a big snowstorm in the area, the station would just shut down because a lazy/dumb kid doesn't want to leave the dorm room to provide the broadcast service or they'd shut down for the day because the college closes class for the day, not understanding the whole world doesn't shut down just because classes are cancelled. If that's the case, the community is better off if they are a closed-circuit facility and on the internet.

 

[techie2]

The folks at my former college station have been very careful in the care and feeding of their Class D. They've done what they can to maximize the signal (even got a modest power increase) but there are no full power channels available. Of course, since they spent some dough renovating the studio, they probably don't want to choke and screw up with the license.

As far as if there's weather or something that closes campus, they do wind up on automation if that happens. Come to think of it, not much different than all the other stations here...you don't get squat for news or information if it's an evening or a weekend.

 

[nd2023]

I have a whole lot to tell about one special class D FM, my former high school station. It was definitely used for teaching, it wasn't just a place for high school kids to goof off on the air. There was a hourly clock which included newscasts. We did broadcasts of football and basketball in the evenings.

The station has changed a lot while I was a part of it. It used to have no unattended automation, it shut down at the end of the school day or after school shows. The website was many years old and had information about students who were then married with kids. The "automation" was a set of 10 minidiscs with recorded shows that was played only between class periods. I listened to those minidiscs so many times that I still know the order of the songs even though I graduated 3 years ago. The same 10 minidiscs are still in use today. Someone who recorded a minidisc show in 1999 said that he could not believe his show was still being used. The board is 20 years old and works perfectly.
I designed a new website that is still being used today, but it gets updated. I started a web stream by streaming a radio tuned to the station from home on my cable modem. The network administrator wouldn't let us stream on the school network.
With the growing popularity of the iPod, someone came up with the idea to podcast the shows. So now, I can't stream the station anymore since I moved out of range, but the podcast gets much more hits than my stream did. It started late during my senior year, so I only have a few of my shows on the podcast, but the years after I graduated, every show is saved for eternity. Then, they decided to replay the day's shows after school and overnight, and all weekend, so the transmitter is never turned off.

I still enjoy listening to my high school station when I pass through the area, and I still keep in touch with the teacher. It's the only school organization that alumni from as far back as 10 years ago still keep in touch. It had changed my life. I wish every high school and/or college could have a broadcasting program like what I had.

 

[bigtom101]

I am the PD of 107.7/WRRC Lawrenceville, the station of Rider University. Up until Feb/March of 2008, the station didn't operate 24/7 and shut down for summer/winter/spring break. With upgrades in automation (aka, USING it) and remote controls for the transmitter, we've been running continuously since March of last year. We are very active in local community charities and organizations, in addition to locally produced public service programming. We are 20 watts, but our signal is decent enough in most of Mercer County for car reception. We just launched web streaming and a website at 1077thebronc.com

We haven't lost the license, and intend on upgrading the signal as soon as we get the money for the engineering studies. I would love to get 100 watts - that would help in the summer time with band openings (WGTY slams us pretty bad), as well as building penetration in Mercer county.

 

[aaronread]

We haven't lost the license, and intend on upgrading the signal as soon as we get the money for the engineering studies. I would love to get 100 watts - that would help in the summer time with band openings (WGTY slams us pretty bad), as well as building penetration in Mercer county.

Hi BigTom - I used to do those kinds of engineering studies for a living. Shoot me a note off-list...I suspect I can save you a lot of money.

 

[stormy01]

If I recall correctly one of the colleges near me had a Class D and because the administration couldn't get past the esthetics of mounting the antenna on a campus building the station had gone silent. I don't know with any certainty if this is what the outcome was but I do remember it being a hot button of discussion.

Tell me that every building on that campus has a pitch roof...they could have placed the antenna low profile on the middle of a flat roof and you would not have been able to see the antenna from the ground, except for on the roof or from an airplane. Sheesh!

 

[nd2023]

I think an antenna for a low power class D station looks pretty nice on top of a building. Makes it feel like the building the antenna is on top of is "important"

 

[aaronread]

I think an antenna for a low power class D station looks pretty nice on top of a building. Makes it feel like the building the antenna is on top of is "important"

Tell that to the www.quchronicle.com/media/storage/paper294/news/2006/09/05/CampusNews/The-Day.The.Music.Died-2257297.shtml]tone-deaf administration of Quinnipiac College[/url] and their www.quchronicle.com/media/storage/paper294/news/2007/02/07/CampusNews/Wqaq-Tower.To.Be.Rebuilt.By.May.Back.On.The.Air.By.Fall-2700729.shtml]adventures with WQAQ's tower[/url]!

 

[johnbasalla]

What a ridiculous and ultimately avoidable situation this Quinnipiac College situation is. A case where there was little understanding of the preciousness of an over-the-air signal. Not everybody who wants one can get one. Very disrespectful to those students the way it was done. To use the title of a 1945 Three Stooges short, a real "Idiots Deluxe".