STATIONS THAT SERVE OTHER MARKETS WITHOUT ATTEMPTING TO

[Geographer]

WOAI AM San Antonio - Serves Austin TX
CFZM AM Toronto - Serves Buffalo NY
WLW AM Cincinnati - Serves Dayton OH
KFI AM Los Angeles - Serves San Diego

Is seem like the the stations that attempt to serve another market mention the city they are trying to serve by after the COL at the top of the hour. Some stations even attempt to conceal the COL. WGTZ Eaton OH used to be creative in concealing their COL by announcing at the top of the hour: "WGTZ Eatin Dayton Alive"

For large stations that actually other cities due to their enormous signals, they seem to mention their COL only. I guess that if you have a big stick, you don't have to call attention to it.

 

[RadioDaze]

Several of our Raleigh-Durham market FMs put a city grade signal into most of the Fayetteville, NC radio market, such as WRAL-FM 101.5/Raleigh, WQDR 94.7 FM/Raleigh, WKSL 93.9/Cary, WDCG 105.1 FM/Durham, and WNNL 103.9/Fuquay-Varina. Fayetteville and Raleigh, about 75 miles apart, share the same TV market, thouh the Fayetteville radio market is half (Cumberland County) in the Raleigh TV market and half (Robeson County)in the Florence-Myrtle Beach TV market. All but one of the above-mentioned stations are on former TV towers that served the market in the analog days. All but two are full class C stations as well with power levels at or near 100 kW.

 

[mimo]

Here's an oddity, WTOR in Buffalo targets Toronto exclusively. 55 WGR and 930 WBEN are incredibly stong in Toronto and have a lot of listeners there. They're considered local stations by some. So is 610 from St. Catherines.

 

[1L6E6VHF]

While "The Big 8", CKLW, served Detroit very much on purpose, they also did very well in Cleveland in the day, and carried ads for Hills Department Stores, which had no stores on Michigan nor Ontario.

During the brief stint of Detroit AM 1500 as WCZY, and in particular, the very brief beginning of that stint before the 1966 simulcasting rule was undone, the night DJs were finding that abut the only calls from listeners were coming from Wawa, Ontario - a mining town north of Sault Ste. Marie that happened to be in 1500's "laser beam" 12-tower nighttime major lobe.

When CFCO (630, Chatham) was oldies, it was not uncommon to hear them playing on portable radios in the Detroit area, where they had a respectable 10-15 mV/m signal. Despite that fact that their old daytime array made it all the way to parts of Indiana, all of the advertising and all of the news was strictly Chatham-oriented. (Today they are country and their day pattern, when it works well, it symmetrical, with less signal toward Detroit).

WRMR (850, Cleveland) had built a new array about 1997 or so, running 50 kW day and with a significant minor lobe that delivered a usable (but not strong) signal of about 1 mV/m to the Detroit area. They were treasure to listen to, with a very eclectic take on adult standards with a little bit of modern popular music. Sadly, the owners cashed out and the station got flipped to sports.

 

[travisl5678]

KATM Modesto, CA has a sizable audience in the East Bay area. During its run as a talk station, KGO often topped the ratings in the Monterrey/Salinas/Santa Cruz market. Most Sacramento stations put a good signal over the North and East bay area

 

[charlestondxman]

WEGX 92.9 in Dillon. Now is a country station for the Florence market, but is strong in most of the Myrtle Beach market and listenable well into NC into the Fayetteville market and nearly to Charleston in SC as well.

WHLZ 92.5 in Manning, SC moved into Charleston about 2002 or 2003 but before that it was a country station for the Florence market. It was clearly audible in most of the Charleston area, and actually got a few rating points for a while.

107.5 out of St. George was a prime example. It served Charleston for nearly 30 years as top 40 and country before moving to Columbia as sports The Game in '07. They were clearly audible in Columbia and Savannah. They carried NASCAR and later South Carolina football, and people listened all over the place.

 

[tomservo]

Well, I mentioned it in the other thread but it still applies here. WYDE-FM in Cullman, Alabama, targets Birmingham almost exclusively, but is strong enough to compete in Tuscaloosa, Huntsville and Gadsden (not sure if Gadsden is actually a market or not.)

WWL New Orleans' big 50 kW signal puts a good strong signal onto many Gulf Coast markets: Biloxi, Mobile, Pensacola, Fort Walton Beach and even Panama City. At least if you're close to the water. But I've seen it show up in the ratings in most of these markets before. I'm in the Mobile market and about 15 miles from the beach but WWL is one of the stronger signals here, even though it's a good 150 miles away. It's basically a local day and night.

Finally, I can mention the massive 100 kW FM WZHT is licensed to Troy, Alabama which does hip hop and rap. Troy is a small town, unrated but the station plays to Montgomery, about 40 miles up the road. It's also known to show up in the ratings of both Columbus, Georgia and Dothan, Alabama. Many moons ago it was more or less the only urban for those markets, but now even with local urban signals it still seems to pop up occasionally. Or at least it did last time I was able to check. Not bad showing up in the ratings in two markets over a hundred miles apart! (Before a co-channel class A came on in my neck of the woods, WZHT was listenable during most of the summer here on the beach of Gulf Shores and the Pensacola area… 120-130 miles from the transmitter site. Ditto the southern Birmingham suburbs, about the same distance away.

 

[rbrucecarter5]

WBAP 820 serves a lot of rural Texas communities. It, along with several DFW stations serve Wichita Falls, Waco, and even Abilene. I remember KMKI 620 Dallas even did a couple of remotes in Abilene.

KLVI 560 is treated like a Houston local, even though it is in Beaumont. Corpus Christi station KCTA 1030 would probably be passable as a Houston rim shot, if it had a format that was relevant.

 

[Cincinnati Kid]

Not only has WLW Radio in Cincinnati served Dayton, Ohio for many years, but also those cities with-in 100-125 miles. I know for many years, the Radio-TV page of the Louisville Couirer-Journal listed WLW Radio's programming grid right along with those for the Louisville radio and TV stations.

 

[rfry]

WJR had quite a few listeners in other markets back in the 1960s (link below)...

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h85/rfry-100/WJRDaytimeStats.gif

 

[ftballfan]

93.7 WBCT Grand Rapids, 104.1 WVGR Grand Rapids, 105.7 WSRW Grand Rapids: These three stations all run grandfathered power. Their tower location (Barry County) helps them serve Kalamazoo, Battle Creek, and Lansing (in addition to Grand Rapids)
Most Grand Rapids stations also serve Muskegon (in fact, two stations with studios in Grand Rapids (104.5 WSNX and 106.9 WOOD) are licensed to Muskegon)
105.3 WHTS Coopersville: Their tower location also allows them to serve Big Rapids in addition to Muskegon and Grand Rapids
106.5 WVFM Kalamazoo: Their tower location allows them to put a usable signal into Grand Rapids (they even mention GR in their legal ID)
99.7 WZDR Sturgeon Bay: They were one of the most popular stations in Ludington and Manistee when they were rhythmic CHR (in fact, one of their DJs played prom at Manistee HS in the mid 2000s)
103.5 WTCM Traverse City: They also cover Ludington, Manistee, and Big Rapids in addition to Traverse City and Cadillac. They've even made the book in Muskegon and Grand Rapids from time to time

 

[ftballfan]

WJR had quite a few listeners in other markets back in the 1960s (link below)...

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h85/rfry-100/WJRDaytimeStats.gif

At that time, it had over 50% in Cheboygan County, 250 miles from Detroit!

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

WJR had quite a few listeners in other markets back in the 1960s (link below)...

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h85/rfry-100/WJRDaytimeStats.gif

At that time, it had over 50% in Cheboygan County, 250 miles from Detroit!

That was probably due to Detroit Tiger baseball and other PBP that was unavailable on local stations at night. The stations that ran the Tigers were mainly Class IV AMs, and FM radios were not common, often large non portable units. There were a few FMs that carried the Tigers, such as WWTV-FM, but that wasn't well received in Cheboygan County.

 

[Steve Green NEPA]

WHLI on Long Island had considerable water-path assistance, along with their directional 10,000 watts, to appear in other books from their own. Two of those books were from different states, as well.
They'd show in the Bridgeport CT book and the Monmouth/Ocean County book in NJ. I don't believe that they pursued any revenue from sponsorhips in those places, though.
A couple of oddities :
They may have been the only Long Island station (AM or FM) to show numbers in three different states. Not bad for an AM directional daytimer playing music in mono.
On their downslide in recent times, one relatively recent book -- can't for the life of me remember which one -- gave WHLI a better rating there than they got in their home Nassau-Suffolk book!

A few Connecticut stations on FM had consistent showings and listenership for years on Long Island's north shore, among them WDRC and WPLR. For years at night, Eastern Long Island had no 'rock and roll' station of its own. 'DRC filled the gap.

There is the old tale about WABC showing up #12 or something in the Pittsburgh book. But those results were from the days when music radio on AM was king. WKBW probably had similar followings in many markets around that time.
I'd guess that WFAN 660 may hold the modern record for showing in the most total books in different states. They'd pop up in Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and a few Connecticut markets.
In fact, back when Arbitron had allowed their 12+ numbers for everyone to be published, WFAN once beat out the sports station WPOP Hartford -- in the Hartford book !

In their great AoR years, WAAF-FM Worcestor MA reportedly showed in a whole bunch of unlikely books itself, including the Albany NY survey.

 

[Icangelp]

Not only has WLW Radio in Cincinnati served Dayton, Ohio for many years, but also those cities with-in 100-125 miles. I know for many years, the Radio-TV page of the Louisville Couirer-Journal listed WLW Radio's programming grid right along with those for the Louisville radio and TV stations.

I was looking at station ratings from the 1930's, and saw that evenings, WLW had a major share of the Memphis market, and the numbers I saw were from the pre-500 KW days. Apparently this was due to the fact that the local Memphis stations didn't carry one of the two NBC networks & so folks picked it up through WLW .

Even through the 1950's, WLW continued to be the station of choice for people in much of central and southern Indiana. Probably thanks to the Reds & unique shows like the 50/50 Club. Probable also true for Northern/Eastern Kentucky and West Virginia.

 

[gar hi]

I grew up 80 miles from New York and listened to WABC day and night even though we were only a few miles from Philly.

Their daytime listenable signal even covers the Philadelphia area.

http://www.musicradio77.com/map.html

 

[schmave]

Not only has WLW Radio in Cincinnati served Dayton, Ohio for many years, but also those cities with-in 100-125 miles. I know for many years, the Radio-TV page of the Louisville Couirer-Journal listed WLW Radio's programming grid right along with those for the Louisville radio and TV stations.

WLW's ratings have never been huge in Columbus, but 700 certainly has its share of listeners here. The signal is good here 24/7, but not as strong as in Dayton, of course. Plus Dayton's pro sports fans lean to Cincinnati far more than here, where loyalties are split with Cleveland. I am sure that helps.
Was sort of surprised to see WJR's sphere of influence spread as far south as Auglaize County, Ohio, in the 60s, but WJR's signal is very good there all the time. It's a local in Toledo and is treated as such.

 

[Geographer]

WBAP 820 serves a lot of rural Texas communities. It, along with several DFW stations serve Wichita Falls, Waco, and even Abilene. I remember KMKI 620 Dallas even did a couple of remotes in Abilene.

KLVI 560 is treated like a Houston local, even though it is in Beaumont. Corpus Christi station KCTA 1030 would probably be passable as a Houston rim shot, if it had a format that was relevant.

I was impressed with the daytime signals of many Texas stations. WBAP sounded like a local in a Wichita Falls hotel room. KTRH puts a near city grade signal into San Antonio. KTSA has a large footprint in Southern Texas. Great ground conductivity, flat terrain and lack of co and adjacent interferers are a perfect combination for great signals. The Great Salt Lake basin is another great area for both AM and FM signals. KSL has a daytime footprint almost as large an the big Midwest clears despite its relatively high dial position. KNRS AM at 570 in Salt Lake City has a listenable daytime signal stretching from the Idaho border to the Arizona border and might actually blanket the entire state. I believe KNRS and KALL (700) are Utah's best daytime signals. Pretty impressive stuff.

 

[rfry]

WJR had quite a few listeners in other markets back in the 1960s (link below)...

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h85/rfry-100/WJRDaytimeStats.gif

At that time, it had over 50% in Cheboygan County, 250 miles from Detroit!

Early in 1964 I drove from lower Michigan to the World's Fair at Flushing Meadows in the borough of Queens in New York City.

I had useful groundwave, daytime reception of WJR using the stock radio in my VW Beetle as far away as Somerset, PA along the Pennsylvania Turnpike (a great-circle path from the WJR transmit site of about 264 miles).

 

[radioman148]

WJR had quite a few listeners in other markets back in the 1960s (link below)...

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h85/rfry-100/WJRDaytimeStats.gif

At that time, it had over 50% in Cheboygan County, 250 miles from Detroit!

Early in 1964 I drove from lower Michigan to the World's Fair at Flushing Meadows in the borough of Queens in New York City.

I had useful groundwave, daytime reception of WJR using the stock radio in my VW Beetle as far away as Somerset, PA along the Pennsylvania Turnpike (a great-circle path from the WJR transmit site of about 264 miles).

I used to receive WJR during the day year round in the Chicago area until WNDZ signed on. Now their splatter makes WJR nearly impossible during the day.