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Not good news for News Radio 970

S

SirRoxalot

From today's Taylor on Radio Info:

Outside of Toronto, a news/talk AM is signing on to serve the city of Mississauga. Elliot Kerr convinces the CRTC regulator that Mississauga is indeed “an underserved and distinct market within the Greater Toronto Area” – and once he accomplished that feat, he pushed past objections from Astral Media to obtain authorization for an AM facility at 960 kHz. It will run 2,000 watts daytime and 280 watts at night.

Read the entire CRTC posting here.
 
The CRTC filing is full of interesting intel. This caught my attention: In 2010, the Toronto radio market generated total revenues of approximately $251 million with a strong aggregate profit before interest and tax margin of 30.3%.

As to WNED-AM 970 getting into Toronto, there's a portion of Toronto that doesn't get WNED-AM because the 50 kw signals of 1010 CFRB and 1050 CHUM create a shadow over the 970 kHz signal. An engineer explained it like this: CHUM @ 1050 kHz - CFRB @ 1010 kHz = 40 kHz ; 1010 - 40 = WNED @ 970 kHz). An AM on 960, even with 280 watts at night on 960, isn't going to help the WNED-AM signal and very likely will create a mishmash in parts of Toronto where the 970 signal once may have been a catch. The new signal on 960 is bound to get some interference from WNED-AM too.
 
It's gotta be a pretty tight signal. According to the CRTC:

...The Commission notes that the 15 mV/m primary daytime contour of the proposed station would provide service to a radius of approximately 10 km from the transmitting antenna site, which includes Mississauga, while the 22.6 mV/m night-time Eu contour will cover a radius of approximately 3 km from the transmitting antenna site including Mississauga. The Commission further notes that the 5 mV/m secondary daytime contour would cover a radius of approximately 18 to 25 km from the transmitting antenna site, which would include Mississauga and a portion of Brampton. As a result, the proposed service area would encompass a population of 586,000 in its daytime primary contour, or approximately 11% of the total population in the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area.

It makes you wonder how they're going to limit the coverage with that strong a signal. Reduced antenna height? Directional array?
 
You know, this is the year 2011,and when I'm in Toronto, all my Buffalo radio stations come in perfect. I just plug my Iphone in to my stereo and a way I go.
 
WNED-AM just can't get a break. Why in this day and age does anyone need to authorize a new AM station when so many are struggling? That makes no sense.

FCC let WNED-AM crank it up to 50KW day and night, then see how they like it! (just kidding)
 
BUFFALOFLYGUY said:
You know, this is the year 2011,and when I'm in Toronto, all my Buffalo radio stations come in perfect. I just plug my Iphone in to my stereo and a way I go.
Click to expand...

That really reinforces my point. If you're in Toronto, and want NPR, why not go to NPR.org? It's easier to remember. If WNYPB wants to offer a web stream for Toronto with separate local content, fine. Otherwise, you're simply taking away from your primary audience for the sake of a few potential listeners in Toronto. And, unless there's more than a few, radio's just not going to attract the same underwriters that TV does. It will simply become a throw-in with a TV deal, devaluing the underwriting slots on WBFO.
 
Looked up some further info on the CRTC site about this new station in Mississauga and found out it'll be non-directional 24/7 and use a tower only 86 feet (26 meters) tall. Evidently the CRTC doesn't require as efficient an antenna as the FCC does, since its efficiency is only equivalent to a one-mile field strength of 160 mv/m at 1 kW, or about 10% less than the FCC minimum for a class B station. It does, however, meet the minimum antenna efficency for graveyard local-channel stations. Looks like it's being run as a Class C (graveyard channel) station, only not on a local channel.
 
This is a head-scratcher given the recent Canadian attitudes and policies regarding AM. They've mostly been relocating AMs to FM, and at an accelerating pace.

As far as harmful interference to WNED, I wouldn't lose much sleep about 2kw from an 86-foot tower. Sounds like the CRTC just wants to scatter a local signal around a limited area.
 
It's a very limited signal, but probably enough to kill whatever signal 970 gets into the GTA. Don Boswell keeps making noise about selling NPR in the GTA. He thinks it's a coup to get WBFO onto Rogers cable. I'm thinkin' that it ain't the gold mine that he's anticipating.
 
Both WNED AM & FM are available in Toronto on the Rogers cable digital box (channels 938 & 939)...however, that would only solve the signal problem in the home, not in the car or other places.
 
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