Could WBAP on 96.7 be the new format

[CW]

Intereting to note that WDAY AM & FM in Fargo aren't even owned by the same people anymore! (Haven't been for close to a decade, in fact)

It happens....KPRC AM and TV (I think there was an FM once in the past) are owned by different owners for about 2 decades now....(The AM has changed hands many times and is now owned by CC....the TV I think only from the Hobby family to Post-Newsweek)..The AM is the controlling callsign....ith their blessing, use of the -FM or -TV on another station is not a problem. I take it the AM and FM are formatted differently.....(true, Fargo's situation is a rare one!)

 

[PhilJSmith67]

When WHIOm 1290 in Dayton Ohio started simulcasting on 95.7 in Dayton they took the WHIO-FM Calls which was never ever on 95.7 at one point. the Original WHIO FM is currently WHKO 99.1 in Dayton.

The issue is not whether the calls were used on that freq before...the issue with WBAP would be its a legacy call (a W WEST of the Mississipi) trying to get a W call on a FM west of the Mississippi where only K calls are issued now. Last I looked, Dayton is EAST of the Miss.....so it can put ANY Wxxx call on its FM it wants, but no Kxxx call.

A station owner can put a W call on an FM west of the Mississippi (or K vica-versa) to complement their heritage AM station, even if the FM station is new. That call can remain on the FM after a sale (as was noted with WDAY-FM), but transplanting it to another COL is generally disallowed. You couldn't, for instance, create WGN-FM Chicago and then transplant the callsign to a stick with a Des Moines COL. The rule is similar for AM/TV pairings, as CW noted for KPRC Houston. Didn't the KMOL call recently get overwritten by the heritage WOAI-TV call?

Another example of wrong-side-of-the-river heritage call on FM... KWK-FM was assigned to 106.5 across the river from St. Louis; the call has since changed back to a "W" though.

 

[oaktree]

The "simulcast" isn't noted in the legal ID, anyway. A separate ID for just the FM could be used at the same time the AM is doing it's ID. It would also avoid an 83 minute long ID.

In my market, I have a station in the South County and a simulcast with different, but similar calls in the North County and both ID together at the exact same time. No need to mention both the AM and FM together, as it is a simulcast only in content. The ads are separate for both stations, though the music, jocks, etc. are exactly the same. They are also listed separately in the Arbitron (usually.)

 

[ISaidSo]

I have a source that tells me there is no chance that they will simulcast WBAP... Sorry guys.

 

[busyradioguy]

I have a source that tells me there is no chance that they will simulcast WBAP... Sorry guys.

I still think it'll be some sort of oldies format. We know it won't be Scott Shannon's "True Oldies", but that doesn't mean no oldies at all.

 

[oldjohnny]

I can't remember ever regularly listening a simulcast before (maybe KVIL-FM/AM back in the day). If you could do WBAP-FM, how would station ID work since 96.7 is licensed to Flower Mound and WBAP to Fort Worth? Something like "The World is changing. Are you listening? WBAP Flower Mound, WBAP-AM Fort Worth-Dallas, WBAP-HD Fort Worth-Dallas"?

Just the dork in me wondering on a Sunday morning. :

If 96.7 was assigned WBAP-FM then the ID would be "WBAP-FM and WBAP-HD1 Flower Mound; WBAP, Fort Worth-Dallas" The FM gets the suffix, not the AM....That the only legal ID they could do.

Let's not forget WBAP AM is in HD, so the legal ID would go as (If KTYS is in HD right now) "WBAP-FM Flower Mound, WBAP-HD1 Flower Mound, WBAP Forth Worth, and WBAP HD1 Forth Worth" Now, I may be wrong since I don't know how AM stations should ID their HD status. Do they ID as K***-HD1 or K***-HD?

I wonder what would the ID sound like if a station has both an AM and FM station simulcasting with the same call letters, the same COL, and in HD. KBNA in El Paso used to have this, but they werent in HD and they recently changed the call letters for their AM station.

 

[oldjohnny]

Intereting to note that WDAY AM & FM in Fargo aren't even owned by the same people anymore! (Haven't been for close to a decade, in fact)

It happens....KPRC AM and TV (I think there was an FM once in the past) are owned by different owners for about 2 decades now....(The AM has changed hands many times and is now owned by CC....the TV I think only from the Hobby family to Post-Newsweek)..The AM is the controlling callsign....ith their blessing, use of the -FM or -TV on another station is not a problem. I take it the AM and FM are formatted differently.....(true, Fargo's situation is a rare one!)

How about KOVE? One station in Wyoming and the other in the Houston area (Galveston TX).

 

[oaktree]

Probably would use separate IDs on each station. Also, HD-1 isn't identified, as it's the main HD carrier. Just "WBAP & WBAP-HD, Forth Worth" will do. Only HD-2 and HD-3 on FM (AM only has 1 HD channel) are required with numeric designations if the sub channels are used.

Plus, the FM City of License ID would be buried with a co-COL "WBAP-FM and WBAP-FM HD (flower mound) Fort Worth, Dallas.

 

[oldjohnny]

Also, HD-1 isn't identified, as it's the main HD carrier. Just "WBAP & WBAP-HD, Forth Worth" will do. Only HD-2 and HD-3 on FM (AM only has 1 HD channel) are required with numeric designations if the sub channels are used.

That's what I assumed, but when WBAP used "WBAP HD1 Forth Worth Dallas" for a while, I was confused.

 

[C414B]

Correct me if I'm wrong here....


but is it not illegal for an FM to simulcast programming originating from an AM station? Or would they designate the "originating" station as being the FM in order to get around this?

 

[eliseatheduck]

Either one can simulcast the other.Cowboy Games on The Ticket are played on the Bone for example. 9-11 several Fm's took the audio of their News, News talk stations ,even Television.

 

[txchipk]

Intereting to note that WDAY AM & FM in Fargo aren't even owned by the same people anymore! (Haven't been for close to a decade, in fact)

It happens....KPRC AM and TV (I think there was an FM once in the past) are owned by different owners for about 2 decades now....(The AM has changed hands many times and is now owned by CC....the TV I think only from the Hobby family to Post-Newsweek)..The AM is the controlling callsign....ith their blessing, use of the -FM or -TV on another station is not a problem. I take it the AM and FM are formatted differently.....(true, Fargo's situation is a rare one!)

How about KOVE? One station in Wyoming and the other in the Houston area (Galveston TX).

You guys are making this too hard...the rules are pretty simple:

(1) Call signs must be unique to a service (AM, FM, LPFM, LPTV, TV). In a local market, any station in a local cluster can share the calls of any other station in its cluster provided it is a different service. To differentiate, all but one of the stations must have a suffix (-FM, -LP, -CA, -TV, -LD, -DT); AM stations never have a -AM suffix.

So, in D/FW, if CBS wanted to, it could make one if its FMs KRLD-FM and one of its TV stations KRLD-TV. Or it could make KTVT become KTVT-TV and change 1080 from KRLD to KTVT. Today, in Lubbock, you have the KJTV calls on four stations: KJTV 950, KJTV-TV 34, KJTV-CA 32 (CA = "low power TV class A), KJTV-LD 33 (LD = "low power TV digital). The owners of the KJTV* outlets also own KXTQ-FM 93.7, KXTQ-CA 46, and CP KXTQ-LP 34 there.

Because of this rule, it allows for call changes that would not be allowed otherwise over the last 20 years: KHOO 99.9 Waco to WACO-FM (because at the time it was co-owned with then WACO 1460 Waco); KMOL 4 San Antonio to WOAI-TV (co-owned with WOAI 1200); KWSJ-FM 98.7 Wichita to KFH-FM (co-owned with KFH in that market); KQMB 102.7 Salt Lake City to KSL-FM (co-owned with KSL 860); WTKL 105.3 New Orleans to WWL-FM (co-owned with WWL 870); etc.

(2) If a call sign is in use already, a station anywhere can change to that call sign if they get permission from the current holder of the call sign. The restriction again is that it must be unique to the service. So, WBZL 39 Miami became WSFL-TV after its owner, Tribune, got the OK from Beasley, the owners of WSFL-FM 106.5 New Bern NC, which has had those calls for 2 decades. Similarly in 1994, KCIK 14 El Paso became KFOX-TV when it got permission from KFOX, an AM in the LA area.

 

[jd]

Yes, Chip, that should clear it up. But "co-owned with KSL 860" ? Try 1160 instead.

Correct me if I'm wrong here....but is it not illegal for an FM to simulcast programming originating from an AM station?

There's no restriction. The old rule, prohibiting AM stations from simulcasting more than 50% of their programming on a co-owned FM, was thrown out in 1986.

 

[oaktree]

Further, if it had separate commercials from the AM's content, it would, technically, not be a simulcast anyway.

 

[CW]

Yes, Chip, that should clear it up. But "co-owned with KSL 860" ? Try 1160 instead.

EHH he was only 3 digits off....probably got 850 and 1160 mixed

 

[lafayetteindependentradio]

The "simulcast" isn't noted in the legal ID, anyway. A separate ID for just the FM could be used at the same time the AM is doing it's ID. It would also avoid an 83 minute long ID.

In my market, I have a station in the South County and a simulcast with different, but similar calls in the North County and both ID together at the exact same time. No need to mention both the AM and FM together, as it is a simulcast only in content. The ads are separate for both stations, though the music, jocks, etc. are exactly the same. They are also listed separately in the Arbitron (usually.)

At times, I've seen the KARN/Little Rock simulcast cluster mentioned together.

In New Orleans, WWL-A/F are mentioned separately, because the last couple of years, Premiere would only allow Limbaugh to air on the AM. Now that Premiere/CC yanked Limbaugh completely from WWL and placed him on their New Orleans CC property WRNO-FM, the separate listings in Arb for WWL-A/F may be a singular listing for the Fall '08 book.

 

[newsmark]

Correct me if I'm wrong here....but is it not illegal for an FM to simulcast programming originating from an AM station?

Isn't it still against the rules for an FM TRANSLATOR to repeat an AM station?

 

[Rick Rose 2.0]

The FCC is now allowing AM stations to apply to use FM translators to improve coverage.

 

[CW]

The FCC is now allowing AM stations to apply to use FM translators to improve coverage.

Only a few STAs allowing such have been issued iirc....it is NOT a regular happening (yet)