Radio Insight is reporting that there may be big changes in Chicago radio this week. Any ideas what they might be? April Fools?
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Rumor Mill Reports Big Changes This Week
- Thread starter Schroedingers Cat
- Start date
If WSCR-FM goes to 96.3, do the WBBM-FM call letters go to 105.9? Still would have to say Elmwood Park in the Top of Hour ID though. In Detroit, it has long been speculated that one of the lower performing Audacy FMs will become WWJ-FM.
If that happens, it will be on 98.7 WDZH, no question.
"On another Chicago board there's been some talk of Audacy wanting to or already shopping the 670/780 tower site and relocating and possibly downgrading the AM's. We'll See I guess."
The FCC, unwisely in my opinion, lowered the required efficiency standards for each class of station. For Class As, it is now 275 mV/m @ 1 km @ 1 kW (171 mV/m @ 1 mile @ 1 kW for oldtimers) . This is below the former minimum efficiency for Class Bs, 282 mV/m @ 1 km @ 1 kW (175 mV/m @ 1 mile @ 1 kW for oldtimers). This means an antenna of substantially less than 1/4 wavelength would meet the minimum efficiency for Class As. While it might make it possible to keep some AM stations on the air a few more years, and allow more flexibility in meeting FAA requirements, it's like shooting one's self in the foot in my opinion. Reduced service areas, and high angle somewhat seasonal daytime skywave, and night skywave radiation causing severe fading in the outer regions of larger Metros, are two severe downsides. Remember that even Class IVs often clamored for half wave plus towers when they got FMs to collocate in the late 1950s and 1960s, to limit daytime fading, even if it required lowering input power. So I shudder at what companies owning and managing radio stations today will do, with their ignorance of immutable Engineering and Physical Laws and Principles, which were well understood by owners and managers as long as 100 years ago, but nearly nonexistent today.
The FCC, unwisely in my opinion, lowered the required efficiency standards for each class of station. For Class As, it is now 275 mV/m @ 1 km @ 1 kW (171 mV/m @ 1 mile @ 1 kW for oldtimers) . This is below the former minimum efficiency for Class Bs, 282 mV/m @ 1 km @ 1 kW (175 mV/m @ 1 mile @ 1 kW for oldtimers). This means an antenna of substantially less than 1/4 wavelength would meet the minimum efficiency for Class As. While it might make it possible to keep some AM stations on the air a few more years, and allow more flexibility in meeting FAA requirements, it's like shooting one's self in the foot in my opinion. Reduced service areas, and high angle somewhat seasonal daytime skywave, and night skywave radiation causing severe fading in the outer regions of larger Metros, are two severe downsides. Remember that even Class IVs often clamored for half wave plus towers when they got FMs to collocate in the late 1950s and 1960s, to limit daytime fading, even if it required lowering input power. So I shudder at what companies owning and managing radio stations today will do, with their ignorance of immutable Engineering and Physical Laws and Principles, which were well understood by owners and managers as long as 100 years ago, but nearly nonexistent today.
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I would hope that no Class A station would ever consider doing this, but it appears that 45 electrical degree monopole tower would meet that minimum efficiency. At 670 kHz, that would be around 183.5 feet. At 780 kHz, 157.6 feet. Class IVs used to use 150 foot minimum height towers, and some still do. However, I know of one Class IV/ Class C with a 68 degree tower, and fading is noticeable 12-15 miles away! I thought something was wrong with the FI meter when I saw the field strength bouncing around. This was early in the afternoon, more than two hours before sunset. It was Fall, not Winter, as I recall.
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The economic landscape is shifting massivly and by EOY more shake up will happen. Broadcasters have no choice but to adress the shinking ad dollars and major layoffs will follow.
It makes me wonder if this downgrading of AMs is catching up to the FCC's downgrade of clear channels back in the 70s. That led to a rise of small AMs chipping away at the clear channel signals, and lowering their overall status. Now with the shrinking ad dollars mentioned above, and the rise of tower land values, those heritage AMs are very vulnerable. If the FCC is going to hold fast to their decision about clear channels, it really makes no sense for radio stations to spend the money to preserve what has already been taken away. Stations aren't selling beyond their local areas anyway, so why maintain the mythology that these stations reach 14 states anymore?
The FCC did not downgrade the clears. By the early 70’s there was essentially no listening to radio at night when the clears Gad their big coverage, and the FCC kept them amply protected out hundreds of miles, despite the proliferation of smaller local station everywhere.
No, it did not. There was no listening to stations 1000 miles away from the 26 Class A clears, so they lost nothing. And their daytime coverage was totally unaffected.
Think of all the huge markets that did not hav a single “clear” like Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Miami, Orlando, Tampa, Birmingham, Memphis, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Houston, Norfolk, Raleigh,Phoenix, San Diego, and many more that did not have a full 1-A clear and you can see that much of America had no full signal station at all.
In May 29, 1980, they limited their signal protection:
It paved the way for 125 new AMs. From your website:
What I'm really saying is that Audacy is likely finding it harder to sit on valuable tower real estate for AM stations that simply make less money than they used to. If they only sell 100 miles out, then they don't need to own all that land, or worry about tower location and height any more. Just do the bare minimum to keep them on the air, while moving the content to FM and online.
Selling tower land to a tower company won't make as much money as selling tower land to a developer, as Cumulus did in LA & DC. I recently drove past the former KABC tower site on LaCienega, and the change in that neighborhood is significant.
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Between Class I-A and Class I-B, there were, until relatively recently, something like 57 Class I stations as I recall. WWL 870 and and WBZ 1030 were the directional Class I-As, who beamed their signals toward the inland areas of the United States. WGY 810, KOA 850, and KNX 1070 are nondirectional Class I-Bs. The other Directional Class I-Bs got a boost toward some areas, giving them close to a City Grade signals in areas closer to the transmitter, around 200-300 miles. Those stations are STILL the only ones with anywhere near true full service to rural areas. FM stations are often jukeboxes with little or no news and weather reports. There are also some former Class II stations and former Class III stations with high power that have usable skywave service.
And the limit went fro,m the whole continental US to less than 1000 miles, allowing unserved areas to get a limited clear channel. And by he early 70’s nobody but a bunch of old f__t DXers w@s listening more than a few hundred miles away.
Only 20 of the A-1 clears got duplicated. In further cases, some existing day timers on 1-A clears got to go full time with highly directional signals… one of those was KTNQ in LA.
Except for a few trucker shows in overnights, nobody has sold outside the daytime ground wave coverage area since the 80’s and, maybe, early 90’s. So nobody was making any money from out of market signals except for some agricultural formats in the Midwest and that was daytime coverage and not on more than one or two of the real clears… WNAX, not WHO.
And many of those urban locations are for lower power regional channels such as KABC or WMAL whic wer closer to their city of license.
Which is why I say the two Audacy signals in Chicago are so vulnerable.
Yet how many of those 1-A and B stations served rural areas since when TV took over by the mid 50’s? There was little or no revenue and agencies bought markets, not regions.
Many of those 125 new AM stations are already deleted, off the air on silent STA, or in serious financial trouble, even more than previously existing stations. Even many FMs are forced to be in underpopulated areas by anticompetitive First Local Service rules and dubious case law, even where they technically can be moved to serve a much larger population, and the alleged Communities of License are nearly non existent and are already covered by many other City Grade signals.
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A perfect case is the 720 AM in Las Vegas. Originally 50 kw, directional. Then cut to lower power. Then is about to turn in the license and is off the air.
Then there is the 50 kw on 1020 in Roswell, It spent much of the last three or four years off the air or on temporary facilities. It's now religious, and likely has nearly no audience.
Or 1210 in Guymon, OK. They tried to move to a larger city, but iHeart put that on hold due to AM decline.
670 in Boise accepted a downgrade to allow the LA area co-channel to upgrade. The LA station never did, but Boise is now a limited facility.
Or 50 kw fulltime 1510 in Spokane which downgraded to an insignificant facility due to costs and land values.
Even the 50 kw station on the Navajo nation in 4-Corners ran into financial troubles and was off or on low power for considerable time a couple of years ago.
There are several others, such as 1100 in Grand Junction known to be "in trouble" due to high costs and the lack of advertiser interest in an AM station.
There are more, but these are among the better examples.
It bills more than WBMX, a decent FM... or more than WPPN, WFMT or iHeart's WCHI. Just because a station is not in the top two or three in ratings does not mean they can't be nicely profitable. This is a business, not a horse race.
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