MN Maniac said:
Thanks, Mark. I didn't know about the new 93.7 in Georgia. Not surprised, since the FCC seems bent on shoehorning in as many new allocations as they possibly can. There's also the (fairly) new 93.7 translator in Jacksonville. Only runs a few watts from the north side of town, if I remember correctly (?) So, 93.7 is now a nasty mess of WOGK and the translator throughout much of the Jacksonville metro. As is 103.7 with WRUF and the eastside translator fighting for the frequency. Neither of these should have been allowed. Sad business.
I'm surprised Dix never tried to move WOGK into Orlando...or sold it to someone who would have. Before Vero Beach moved from 93.5 to 93.7, it would have been possible to operate from either Orange City or Paisley and still put the required grade of signal over Ocala.
I thought about the very same thing years ago about moving, what was then the WFUZ-FM 93.7 Ocala tower to a location suitable to place a primary signal over Daytona Beach and Orlando. As you stated Paisly or Orange City would be perfect locations to occomplish that objective, identifying as WFUZ Ocala - Daytona Beach -Orlando.
The problem is, even with Vero Beach still on 93.5 as a class A, the best WFUZ/WOGK could have done is move somewhere near Leesburg and downgrade to a C1 because of short-spacing issues. And downgrading would have, for the most part, defeated the whole purpose behind moving to Orlando although such a move as a full C would have tremendously increased the station value of, what was then, WFUZ.
Also, as Kmagrill has stated, all translators
AND LPFM are licensed as a "secondary" radio service, meaning LPFM and translators are not protected by primary licensed stations. To put it another way, all primary service FM stations such as WOGK have the "right of way" over translators and LPFM even if the primary licensed stations begins operation after the translator or LPFM. I believe there is a PRM at the FCC to change LPFM licensed stations from "secondary" status to "Primary" or some variation thereof allowing the LPFM more protection than they currently have.
In Ocala there was a 57 watt translator operating on 99.3 which had been in operation for years. When WXRA-FM 99.3 Inglis began broadcast operations last year from a tower location just North of Dunnellon, the Ocala translator - W257BA - unable to find an alternate channel to move, was forced to cease broadcast operations because the translator on 99.3 was causing interference with the WXRA co-channel 60dbu contour.
That's basically the "long and short" of it... I hope that helps explain the situation a little better.
Mark Tillery
J. M. Tillery & Associates, P. A.
www.jmtillery.com
http://jmtillery.blogspot.com
[email protected]