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We Own It, 98.7

[/subAll these scenarios are fun, but if Citadel had the money to buy a station just to shut it down and upgrade another facility, they would have done something much easier.... They would have just bought 100.3 outright. End of problem! ]

Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you. I suppose I should have said, "How can you think 'just' buying 100.3 would be 'easier.' Don't you think they probably tried to do that, and found it was not easy?"

It is likely that you know more abput this than I do, but from what I read here and on other boreds (sic), the owner of 100.3 has ignored numerous offers. As to the Citadel financial capability, I understand they have just emerged from a half-billion dollar bankruptcy flush with cash.
 
Big Bopper said:
[/subAll these scenarios are fun, but if Citadel had the money to buy a station just to shut it down and upgrade another facility, they would have done something much easier.... They would have just bought 100.3 outright. End of problem! ]

Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you. I suppose I should have said, "How can you think 'just' buying 100.3 would be 'easier.' Don't you think they probably tried to do that, and found it was not easy?"

It is likely that you know more abput this than I do, but from what I read here and on other boreds (sic), the owner of 100.3 has ignored numerous offers. As to the Citadel financial capability, I understand they have just emerged from a half-billion dollar bankruptcy flush with cash.
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Not quite half a billion, but a lot more than they had six months ago.

They tried to buy 100.3 from what I've heard from several people close to both sides but were told "come back when you're serious" or something in that vein.
 
I just had a thought :( insert joke here) Citadel owns stations in Knoxville, Chattanooga, and Atlanta. They are having coverage issues in Knoxville and 106.7 in Atlanta could stand a signal upgrade. What is to stop them from doing a few downgrades in Chattanooga (106.5) and upgrading their stations in the bigger markets? I am not sure what they could move or swap to help Knoxville but as an earlier poster said CC has done it before other markets and Citadel has a little financial breathing room now.
 
CC did it all over Ohio (started in the Jacor days), but it is a process that takes years. They still didn't get everything moved into bigger markets that they wanted to.

If Citadel even could find a way to re-arrange the dial, the question remains about how long Citadel plans to keep markets like Knoxville.
 
jetfli said:
Suppose you own 98.7 and 99.1, Knoxville market. You can't get a good upgrade on either signal because you are too close to other, nearby frequencies on both sides. So you petition the FCC to allow you to shut them down and broadcast a single signal on 98.9. You won't have to worry about nearby adjacents, because that was what you shut down. The closest stations using the same freq are in Lebanon, TN, Paintsville, KY, and Bethel, NC. So you really could get a decent beam out on 98.9.
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You forgot WSPA Spartanburg, SC and WWIK McClellanville, SC.
 
jetfli said:
Suppose you own 98.7 and 99.1, Knoxville market. You can't get a good upgrade on either signal because you are too close to other, nearby frequencies on both sides. So you petition the FCC to allow you to shut them down and broadcast a single signal on 98.9. You won't have to worry about nearby adjacents, because that was what you shut down. The closest stations using the same freq are in Lebanon, TN, Paintsville, KY, and Bethel, NC. So you really could get a decent beam out on 98.9.
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I'm a little late to this part of the discussion, but what's being discussed here isn't really possible, at least not in the form it's being discussed.

Once an FM allocation is on the table of allocations, it can't just be removed. Even if you buy the station using that allocation and turn its license in to the FCC, the allocation remains protected (and, worse yet, available for new applications from your competition!)

Now, you *can* move an allocation out of the way - say, taking that 98.7 and downgrading it to a class A in some distant community (where it becomes "first local service") to make room for a 99.1 upgrade. But that's hard to do with the dial as full as it is, and as other posters have noted, it can take years to accomplish. It's not a project you undertake if you're bankrupt.
 
Scott Fybush said:
I'm a little late to this part of the discussion, but what's being discussed here isn't really possible, at least not in the form it's being discussed.
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The allocation may stay on the books, but an FM signal can be completely shut down, without concern for protecting as an adjacent. The FCC has granted this in the past, but it has been rare, and, at the same time, they have said that they do not like to do it. It very well could take years and a lot of money, and it may not happen, but it is posiible.
 
Let's be honest for a moment, 98.7 has absolutely no hope of ever being anything more than what it is, an 8k watt station licensed to Oliver Springs and broadcasting from a transmitter located in Heiskell.
 
Is radio locator wrong? Looks like 98.7 is in east Anderson Co. somewhere near the interstate.
 
jetfli said:
The allocation may stay on the books, but an FM signal can be completely shut down, without concern for protecting as an adjacent. The FCC has granted this in the past, but it has been rare, and, at the same time, they have said that they do not like to do it. It very well could take years and a lot of money, and it may not happen, but it is posiible.
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Do you have a citation for this?

Every example I've ever seen, and the rules as I understand them, includes protection for vacant allocations.

The only way to make a vacant allocation go away completely is if a petitioner can show that there is no interest in operating on that frequency. That's not an easy showing to make. All it takes is one "expression of interest" in the frequency and it's back to protected status.
 
If it could have been upgraded Jim Dick would have found a way 15 years ago. After he purchased the station he moved it as close as he could to Knoxville and still cover the city of license of Oliver Springs. Go over to Oliver Springs and see if you can hear 98.7 ... you can't. It was his last project. 98.7 is 8kw located between two ridges that can not be heard fully in the Metro. I am surprised that Citadel is telling the public and the advertising community that they will make it better over the next several months. Anything at the FCC can take years sometimes decades assuming something can be done. Most stations have very little room to move and it has gotten much tighter over the last 15 years. A new transmitter is not going to make it sound better or the footprint bigger. The only thing that can be done is to turn off the stereo pilot! Good Luck.
 
BillBattle said:
If it could have been upgraded Jim Dick would have found a way 15 years ago. After he purchased the station he moved it as close as he could to Knoxville and still cover the city of license of Oliver Springs. Go over to Oliver Springs and see if you can hear 98.7 ... you can't. It was his last project. 98.7 is 8kw located between two ridges that can not be heard fully in the Metro. I am surprised that Citadel is telling the public and the advertising community that they will make it better over the next several months. Anything at the FCC can take years sometimes decades assuming something can be done. Most stations have very little room to move and it has gotten much tighter over the last 15 years. A new transmitter is not going to make it sound better or the footprint bigger. The only thing that can be done is to turn off the stereo pilot! Good Luck.
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110% correct.
 
BillBattle said:
If it could have been upgraded Jim Dick would have found a way 15 years ago. After he purchased the station he moved it as close as he could to Knoxville and still cover the city of license of Oliver Springs. Go over to Oliver Springs and see if you can hear 98.7 ... you can't. It was his last project. 98.7 is 8kw located between two ridges that can not be heard fully in the Metro. I am surprised that Citadel is telling the public and the advertising community that they will make it better over the next several months. Anything at the FCC can take years sometimes decades assuming something can be done. Most stations have very little room to move and it has gotten much tighter over the last 15 years. A new transmitter is not going to make it sound better or the footprint bigger. The only thing that can be done is to turn off the stereo pilot! Good Luck.
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\\

Not so...so much has changed in FM allocations since Jim Dick was captain. Many Class Cs have been downgraded to C0s and stations hundreds of miles away can move a few miles and open up a frequency. Things can change any day. There are fewer nowadays but they still happen.

We keep up with these changes on a daily basis because something up in Eastern TN can affect our operations way over in NC, SC and northern GA. We're not that far apart as the crow flies.

I ran a frequency search on WOKI at 98.7 and the only two stations restricting it are WNML on 99.1 and WNRX on 99.3. If each were moved just a few miles, 98.7 will slide down to that ridge north of town where the big towers are located. The circle WSPA Spartanburg, SC Class C on 98.9 falls about there. You would have to change city of license to some licensable community where the city grade falls. Since Oliver Springs has another service...no problem. You might even be able to keep 99.1 and 99.3 where they are now by using a DA although second and third adjacent are tougher to get done than co channels or first adjacents.

As to being able to get rid of FM allotments, you can't just delete it because a station goes off the air. It either has to be moved or changed to another channel if one works. The rare times the FCC has deleted an allotment is if there were special circumstances like they made an allotment on top of an airport and that was the only place the channel would work. Also, if those aren't caught before a station is applied for...even those can move forward. I know of at least two cases where the FCC allotted a channel and accepted applications before it was discovered there was no fully spaced allotment site that city graded the community of license. The FCC just told all applicants to specify directionals and move on.
 
I don't know Art. It seems there might be some serious holes in that exercise. The signal is seriously short spaced with Liberty, Cookeville, Somerset, Trenton, Morristown and the list goes on.

They can't move the tower as they're under a seriously long contract and they're out of money, which is the one thing it takes lots of to make the impossible possible.

As the dust settles many disenchanted talk listeners will simply find another venue to entertain them. 'Cause they ain't going to be able to hear 98.7 if they're North of Emory Road or South of 25W.
 
Then again, putting all that high-dollar programming on 98.7 could be considered an 'improvement'. It wouldn't be a lie. It would be a huge, stinking, gooey, bran flake-enhanced, steaming pile of public relations. But it certainly wouldn't be a lie.
 
98.9/Spartanburg is not going to move or downgrade. They're a full Class C at close to the max height of 2,000 feet HAAT. In order to drop to C0, they would have to lose over 900 feet and/or cut output below 100kW. Doing so would seriously compromise their signal into Anderson which is part of their market. It would also weaken them in Asheville. As would moving south to a shorter stick. Even if Citadel offers significant $$$, it won't happen. Entercom doesn't need the money and they're smarter than this.

98.5/Kingsport is also a full C at maximum facilities. They're not likely to downgrade either since doing so would destroy their regional coverage.

98.7 is what it is: A drop-in allocation with limited coverage. Given the number of co and first adjacent stations in relatively close proximity, they're lucky to have a C3 this close to Knoxville.
 
Tennessee Cowboy said:
Then again, putting all that high-dollar programming on 98.7 could be considered an 'improvement'. It wouldn't be a lie. It would be a huge, stinking, gooey, bran flake-enhanced, steaming pile of public relations. But it certainly wouldn't be a lie.
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Let's see. The River, Smooth Jazz, EarlFM, True Oldies and now Talk.

5 formats. Five years. Don't see many people having trust in this one either.
 
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