Friday's digest of FCC actions announced that the FCC has granted WPEN's application to increase its day power to 25 kW. WPEN will use the three towers in its former night array at what has become the station's daytime site in W Philadelphia. The pattern will send a very slightly diminished signal to the northwest and a much stronger signal to the southeast--toward Philadelpha and southern New Jersey. No tower construction is involved, just a new transmitter, new phasor, and probably new transmission lines and antenna-tuning units. Based on the speed with which WPEN built its new 21-kW night facilities at the WWDB site once the FCC approved, it is reasonable to expect the new day signal to be on the air by mid-summer. Typically, the longest lead-time item in upgrades of directional AMs has proven to be the phasing network (phasor). There aren't many suppliers for these custom items and the suppliers are notoriously slow to deliver. But money talks and most likely enough of it will move a station ahead in the queue. Perhaps WPEN put in its order in anticipation of the application being granted, thus improving the likelihood of early delivery.
An interesting question is whether WWDB will apply to operate nights at low power from the WPEN day site. WWDB might be able to get permission to use 50 or 60 watts at night from WPEN's towers. The signal would probably be listenable in a suprisingly large portion of Philadelphia and the project would not be tremendously expensive--well worth the cost to Beasley, I think. WWDB's value would instantaneously increase significantly.
An interesting question is whether WWDB will apply to operate nights at low power from the WPEN day site. WWDB might be able to get permission to use 50 or 60 watts at night from WPEN's towers. The signal would probably be listenable in a suprisingly large portion of Philadelphia and the project would not be tremendously expensive--well worth the cost to Beasley, I think. WWDB's value would instantaneously increase significantly.