Big ESPN has applied to move the 710 transmitter to the current 1110 Radio Disney site in Irwindale. Power will be reduced from 50k/10k day/night to 32k/2.5k. RD CE Brian Clark also was recently assigned to be in charge of 710 also. There have been no FT engineering employees at 710 since early 2016
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KSPN 710 Tx to Move
- Thread starter imlayguy
- Start date
As an "inside observer" has told me, the land is worth more than the station and the station itself is just a platform for the streaming services. It has little stand-alone value.
The area is zoned for high density residential (apartments or condos) or light commercial (retail and service, no auto shops or anything with things that could spill into the concrete river). That means it is worth a lot.
Remember, the KHJ site sold for $57 million, more than double what was paid for the station and the land in 1989. If you add in the $10 million the station itself sold for, Liberman got tipple the purchase price. And the land was reportedly junior Liberman's own property, so he made a nice profit there.
I don't think they care. The format is mostly used to generate a stream. OTA listening is not important. But your question is certainly valid.
Under current rules I think that they keep the few stations to qualify for the performance rights "discount" streamed radio stations get, even if that is relatively small change for talk format stations.
My thinking is that the Radio Disney Country experiment hasn't really panned out the way they expected. At least not from what I can see. They put a lot of money into it for limited results. The 1110 signal feeds an FM translator. They could switch the 710 signal to the translator if they want to keep the country programming.
But I agree that the land under the 710 tower is very valuable. Surprised it lasted this long.
The land has zoning that restrict it, apparently, to no more than two residential or commercial floors with basement level parking. So the value is typically LA metro high, but not at a premium. The area is not highly desirable, but not dreadful either. With the current excess of commercial space, apartments or condos seem the right formula.
I lived two blocks away from the site for a while after the Northridge quake ruined my Studio City apartment; so I probably spent 6 months with 710's blanketing zone causing me cancer or something like that...
If the terrestrial outlet for ESPN in Los Angeles is really just a funnel for their streaming services (and I am somewhat skeptical of this), for that purpose, NOT have the best signal might actually be beneficial.
KRDC 1110 already has a translator..K256CX 99.1. The "experiment" was simply to get music royalty rates lower... they argued, i believe, that the stream is a simulcast of a terrestrial station.. which makes royalty rates lower then if it was online only streaming
That's correct but they could do that with the AM only. My view is they used the translator to compete with KKGO. From what I can see, it's had no effect. But the 1110 signal will be the better of the two once KSPN's antenna moves.
How long has KSPN and its predecessors been transmitting from the present site? The station has apparently been on 710 since the late 1920’s, but Google Street View shows a post WWII tower setup (which of course could have been rebuilt one or more times.) Which was there first, the transmitter facility or the surrounding neighborhood?
The neighborhood is all Post-WW II construction, mostly from the 60s and later. What I see is that the whole area was mostly orange and fruit groves and light agriculture. Most of the population in the Valley in the pre-war era was what is now downtown Burbank and along the foothills that now have Ventura Blvd as the main road.
KMPC was originally "The Station of the Stars" in Beverly Hills with 500 watts. It upped power and moved to the San Fernando Valley sometime in the early 40's when it got a power increase; the CP to move to the San Fernando Valley was granted in September, 1941. It appears that they did not complete the installation until August of 1942.
At that time, the land was nearly all agricultural in that area, and the only residences were those of landowners and workers.
Correct. I found this at the KMPC History site:
On September 19, 1942, with the help of the new Director Of Engineering, Lloyd Sigmon (inventor of the now famous “Sig-Alert”), KMPC increased its power to 10,000-watts FULL TIME and moved the transmitter to its present location on Burbank Boulevard (East of Coldwater Canyon) in North Hollywood.
Is that still true? I thought the discounted streaming rate for a simulcast of a terrestrial station went away last time the royalty rates were reset. But I'm not totally familiar with the whole deal so I could be wrong.
The discount has to do with the songwriters royalty, and the view is AM/FM is already paying the royalty on those songs once, so they shouldn't have to pay full rate again.
The royalty rates you're talking about are the royalties that go to labels and artists, and they never offered a discount to AM/FM stations.
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