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What’s Next For AM 620?
- Thread starter DToTheJ
- Start date
I predict nothing will change on 620 for the foreseeable future. In five years, who knows…
If it was my decision I would continue the simulcast for two years, then determine how much of the audience has migrated to FM. There is likely some minimum rating number on AM that would justify continuing the simulcast; below that it would be time to flip, sell, or shut down the AM.
Nothing is gonna change on 620 anytime soon. However, as I suggested a couple years ago when I said put WDAE on 95.7, I also suggested that there's a hole in the market for classic country. As US-103.5 (and 99.5 QYK for that matter) is pretty much new hit pop country, it would be smart to flip 620 to country classics depending on how they're selling the iHeart cluster. In my opinion, AM 620 is the best AM signal on the West coast of Florida and is still quite valuable and "could" be viable as a music station with a format that fits. Otherwise, maybe they should just put NewsRadio WFLA on it and sell off 970 and 1250. It's getting to the point where I'm not so sure those two co-located AM signals are worth keeping if they can get something for em. Why keep paying the power bill on these AM signals unless you really need them for something? WHNZ is a complete joke and waste of energy. You obviously keep WFLA and could stick it on the best AM signal in the market.
Remember that 620 was one of the first, if not the first AM directional stations. In an agreement with the FRC and the 620 station in Milwaukee, the Tampa Bay station became a significant day and night signal "way back when".
When I look at the situation at WDAE-AM, my mind goes back to what happened to KTAR-AM after Bonnville, KTAR-AM's owner flipped 98.7 "The Peak" (adult hits) to KMVP and an all-sports format. KMVP-FM carries local shows during the daytime and ESPN overnights. KMVP-FM is the home of the Phoenix Cardinals (football), Phoenix Suns (basketball), and Arizona State University Sun Devils (football and basketball).
KTAR-AM (also on 620 kHz), on the other hand, carries ESPN programming almost 24 hours a day. The station also carries most Arizona Diamondbacks games and football and basketball games from the Arizona State Sun Devils and Phoenix Suns when those games conflict with Cardinals games on KMVP-FM.
I expect that, eventually, WDAE-AM will wind up like KTAR-AM, albeit with a different sports network (Fox) from which it takes its network programming.
KTAR-AM (also on 620 kHz), on the other hand, carries ESPN programming almost 24 hours a day. The station also carries most Arizona Diamondbacks games and football and basketball games from the Arizona State Sun Devils and Phoenix Suns when those games conflict with Cardinals games on KMVP-FM.
I expect that, eventually, WDAE-AM will wind up like KTAR-AM, albeit with a different sports network (Fox) from which it takes its network programming.
If you want a sneak peak of what that would sound like, how iHeart does classic country, just check out Sarasota’s 92.1 CTQ.
Been listening online at work.
They're still saying AM 620 for now, hope that stays.
I've seen 620 on their new logo too.
They changed their call in number, there was no reason to do that, they could have kept the old number, there is nothing wrong with it.
I live in Orlando near Universal and can get 620 OK while driving around during the day. I lose them at night.
Due to a LPFM in Kissimmee which seems to have a rather strong signal for 22 watts, I cannot pick up 95.7.
And yes, I know about the app.
They're still saying AM 620 for now, hope that stays.
I've seen 620 on their new logo too.
They changed their call in number, there was no reason to do that, they could have kept the old number, there is nothing wrong with it.
I live in Orlando near Universal and can get 620 OK while driving around during the day. I lose them at night.
Due to a LPFM in Kissimmee which seems to have a rather strong signal for 22 watts, I cannot pick up 95.7.
And yes, I know about the app.
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I get 620 just fine way up in Pensacola Beach
When iHeart gives a spoken-word AM station an FM simulcast, it often leaves the format on the AM station indefinitely. KFBK Sacramento, KNRS Salt Lake, WGY Albany, WSYR Syracuse, WERC Birmingham and others continue to air their formats on both AM and FM.
So iHeart may do the same in Tampa Bay.
So iHeart may do the same in Tampa Bay.
620 is really good AM signal. I remember a year or two ago listening to the Rays loud and clear on a pocket radio while sitting on the beach on St. George Island in the panhandle.
When I moved to Ohio from Florida 55+ years ago, I spent my evenings diddling around with my radio trying to pick up the AM stations I listened to from the Tampa Bay area. The only one I could pick up was what is now WDAE [then WSUN] and that was fighting it out with WTMJ out of Milwaukee. Then a religious station in Knoxville upped their power and obliterated any chance of me picking up WSUN. But with so much electronic crap blasting out noise all over the AM spectrum today it's hard to pick up anything nowadays.
There's all kinds of stories regarding how that came about. WLW 700 had to protect CFRB 690 when they were 500 kW. Not sure about the time line. Seems like the phasing was done with transmission line lengths at first, not a full fledged phasor, just a power divider.
On coverage, from what a Pennsylvania guy's observations are worth:
620 WDAE was the second- or third- loudest AM signal at the Folks house in Florida's The Villages. I haven't had occasion to listen in a car up I-75 in ten years, but it seems to me that route is all of that nicely populated stretch until it joins the Turnpike.
With AM radio approaching the point when the Father Time 55+ demo will be all it has as listenership, 620 might do well to get a head start on things by trying out as full-service as the budget allows. Though I'd like to see the Standards -- my parents' music -- Bill Alm's suggestion of classic C&W sounds just as delicious.
Am still puzzled by the eternally steady showing of Classical music stations in every big market in the country .... music without vocals composed by foreign writers like Debussy, Bach, Mozart et al who have left us before the US was a country ..... while the newer Great American Songbook has gotten short shrift on stations with lousy signals. And in FLORIDA of all places. Maybe sooner than we think, radio is going to have to start paying attention programming
to over 55 with something other than politics and syndicated sports**.
In a distant reception note: Back in the late 60's, many an overnight had a weak but steady signal -- almost a regular -- from WSUN 620.
Up in Queens NY.
Of the other Tampa Bay stations, only WLCY would peek in on occasion.
**(From a rock n roller kid weaned on the Stones, Beach Boys, Chiffons, Rascals et al: 'I can't open minds at I-Heart.....but I can dream, can't I?')
620 WDAE was the second- or third- loudest AM signal at the Folks house in Florida's The Villages. I haven't had occasion to listen in a car up I-75 in ten years, but it seems to me that route is all of that nicely populated stretch until it joins the Turnpike.
With AM radio approaching the point when the Father Time 55+ demo will be all it has as listenership, 620 might do well to get a head start on things by trying out as full-service as the budget allows. Though I'd like to see the Standards -- my parents' music -- Bill Alm's suggestion of classic C&W sounds just as delicious.
Am still puzzled by the eternally steady showing of Classical music stations in every big market in the country .... music without vocals composed by foreign writers like Debussy, Bach, Mozart et al who have left us before the US was a country ..... while the newer Great American Songbook has gotten short shrift on stations with lousy signals. And in FLORIDA of all places. Maybe sooner than we think, radio is going to have to start paying attention programming
to over 55 with something other than politics and syndicated sports**.
In a distant reception note: Back in the late 60's, many an overnight had a weak but steady signal -- almost a regular -- from WSUN 620.
Up in Queens NY.
Of the other Tampa Bay stations, only WLCY would peek in on occasion.
**(From a rock n roller kid weaned on the Stones, Beach Boys, Chiffons, Rascals et al: 'I can't open minds at I-Heart.....but I can dream, can't I?')
I know of a number of "intentional" directional stations in Latin America that used tower spacing and transmission line length instead of a phasor.
At HJED 820 in Cali, Colombia, the Westinghouse 50 kw rig installed in the early 60's had two lines leading out of the transmitter. At some point between the two towers, one doubled back to the first tower, creating an oval pattern that covered the Cauca River valley.
Later that decade, I shared 660 kHz in Ecuador's two largest cities. The one in Quito I made intentionally directional using the same technique I had seen in Cali: we had a north and south tower, spaced so that we would get an elongated oval going north and south over the Andean zone.
Then, in Argentina Radio 10 in Buenos Aires was built far west of downtown, and we had a "floating" tower the the west of the main one, pushing the 100 kw signal slightly towards downtown. The market, even 25 years ago, was very noisy so we wanted a bit more signal in the densest part of that city of about 21 million.