Cumulus Surrenders Suburban New York Digital AM
Cumulus Media has surrendered the license of 1230 WFAS White Plains NY. WFAS was the last property remaining from Cumulus'
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Cumulus Surrenders Suburban New York Digital AM(WFAS) - Radio Insight
- Thread starter speer360
- Start date
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So much for all-digital MA3 saving AM.
WFAS was a dinky 1kw mediumwave station. A standard analog signal wouldn’t have saved it.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Now that the license has been turned in, the FCC can hold an auction, and some real broadcaster can bid on the license.
Or perhaps not. Remember what happened when they tried to auction off the vacant AM frequencies in St. Louis? No bidders.
I think in White Plains the number of bidders would be a negative number. 😆
Perhaps you don’t need the Hubble or James Webb telescopes to study black holes, where even light can’t escape. You instead examine basket case AM stations on earth where money doesn’t escape.
I believe this now leaves only WLNA as a AM station licensed to Westchester County.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
There is a lot of truth behind that quip. We know from recent history (the past decade or so, especially) and comments in the "Saving AM Radio" thread that there are a lot of AM stations, many of them in smaller markets, where stations are struggling. Much of the time, the problem is a dwindling amount of local revenue as locally-owned businesses fail; that happened a lot in the past when the "big box" retailers supplanted the corner hardware store or clothing shop, but the frequency of those businesses going "belly up" accelerated during the pandemic and quite honestly small-town America still hasn't recovered.
Again, it's a case of lower revenue, no accompanying decrease in overhead (let's face it, even if you run a syndicated format 24/7 and the salespeople do their own production, that electric bill at the transmitter and the one at the offices still have to be paid) ... recipe for Chapter 7.
Proof of this is that we're even seeing AMs with a translator go permanently silent. If the translators are supposed to help "save" AM, they are not a universal solution. For a 1kw with no translator, the handwriting was on the wall even before WFAS went all-digital (which I think was a stupid move on Cumulus' part, given the market size).
Instead of simply turning in the license, I'm wondering why Cumulus did not donate WFAS to Multicultural Media, as the owners of WVOX 1460 AM had done. Even if many may feel a station such as WVOX had little value, someone has gone through the trouble of purchasing it, and preparing to build a temporary facility as part of an effort to return it to the air.
It may relate to your previous question.
Well, also up that way is the former 1310 WVIP in Mt. Kisco, now WRVP, operating in Westchester. But it too is a shell of its former self.
Perhaps–and this is a bit of a stretch–if Cumulus hadn't sold 103.9 FM and let it continue on as WFAS-FM, simulcasting the digital AM station listened to by barely anyone, it may have kept 1230 AM alive a bit longer.
It would have also helped out Westwood One by maintain a NYC-area clearance for its talkers.
But we'll never know now, will we?
It would have also helped out Westwood One by maintain a NYC-area clearance for its talkers.
But we'll never know now, will we?
It always seemed a boneheaded decision to make WFAS AM all-digital. Relatively few people listen to FM HD. Probably way less were inclined to listen to AM HD, if they even had a car radio capable of receiving it. Indeed probably only a very small amount of people realized WFAS AM was even on the air for the past few years, after it went all-digital.
Maw and paw just can't wait to play stax o' waxNow that the license has been turned in, the FCC can hold an auction, and some real broadcaster can bid on the license.
Now that I own a vehicle that receives HD AM, the last time I was in the coverage area I decided to give it a listen to see how all digital AM sounded. Couldn’t recall the frequency off top of my head so I tuned to AM and hit seek. Didn’t occur to me that seek will not locate an all digital station, as it’s only looking for analog signals. I had my spouse google it and tuned manually. It locked fairly quickly, faster than analog to HD FM, and it did sound good.
But alas, it wasn’t meant to be.
Another negative about all digital AM - if you don’t know it’s there, you won’t find it.
And to be clear, I’m not against all digital. I just wish it’d come sooner, or something else comparable.
Perhaps it just wasn't worth the trouble to donate WFAS let alone sell it. If it had stayed all-digital, there would've been hardly any listeners. If it had changed back to analog, it would've cost money and require FCC approval. Surrendering the license was the best option in this case.
We HAD an digital-only AM here in Greater Boston at 650 KHz. From where I live, I couldn't receive the analog 650, but was able to pull in the digital 650. Alas, I was probably one of the few who bothered because the station is no longer there, in either analog or digital format.
Jeff Chang is trying to keep WVOX on the air. I don't see WVOX handing in their license any time soon. I don't know him or know his plans, but if he wants to try to salvage WVOX, more power to him.
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