Will Any Transmitters move to the new spot

[StemCell]

I have heard the new building has been completed at one ------ plaza/place and stands 1260 feet from base to top mast. Do any NYC signals plan to move to this location, not from NYC I don't know if this building is even finished or if it exists its just something I heard. I know the Empire is overcrowed with antennas so this would be a nice change to move a few, also, is construction underway at the new Freedom Tower at the Trade Center spot, and will any signals move there and what would be the completed height...In Philly we have the antenna farm which is a specticle in itself.

 

[Ozman]

It would be a good Idea. where was this buliding "proposed." most of us can see part if not all of the NYC skyline if your on a hill or on the water within about 35 miles of NYC. I am 30 miles away and can see the whole skyline from old greenwich on the water. I have not seen a tall building go up yet however.. One thing I wanted to mention tho is I always wondered if 103.5 KTU could move to new Rochelle on top of one of the new buildings and boost their bitch up to 100,000 watts since their is no side band issues towards CT.
I best wait and hear from the pros on this one

-OZ

 

[fybush]

I think the "new tall building" in question might be One Bryant Park, at 42nd and Sixth. 945 feet to the top of the structure, plus a decorative spire:

http://www.durst.org/i_bp_arch.asp

There won't be any broadcast tenants at One Bryant Park - Durst owns the taller Four Times Square a block away and already has plenty of room for radio and TV up there.

As for the Freedom Tower, it will probably have TV on it whenever it's done. Most of the FM stations can't go down there because of spacing issues, and even the few that could probably won't - the consensus, when WTC was still standing, was that Empire was a better spot for FM.

 

[neo11]

Back when the WTC was still standing, I always had reception issues with the stations that broadcast from there (93.1, 93.9, 103.5, 89.9) compared to the Empire stations. 103.5, especially, seemed to be a victim of severe multipath.

And speaking of 103.5, there is no way they would ever relocate their tower outside Manhattan and there is no way they can be boosted to 100,000 watts, or any station in the Northeast for that matter. The dial is far too crowded.

 

[Bob1370]

Any of the NYC stations COULD bump up to 50,000 watts ERP, IF they were willing to drop antenna height to 500 feet above average terrain. In a town where literally hundreds of structures exceed that height, that would be nuts...it'd be like a station in mountainous terrain choosing to locate its antenna in a valley between peaks.

There might even be one or two that have enough space between them and the nearest co-channel or adjacent channel stations to petition for an upgrade to Class C-0 or full C status in purely technical terms, but I don't think the FCC is allowing any more Class C's to be squeezed into the Northeast corridor on top of the grandfathered ones already on the air since the 1950s in New England or upstate New York. It's tough enough for Class A's with an unusually wide amount of room between them and their co-channel or adjacent channel neighbors to get an OK for an upgrade to B1 or B status (although a few have been allowed to do so, including WCAA, which is a B1 on a normally class A channel, and another up in Syracuse).

 

[Ultimajock]

Back when the WTC was still standing, I always had reception issues with the stations that broadcast from there (93.1, 93.9, 103.5, 89.9) compared to the Empire stations. 103.5, especially, seemed to be a victim of severe multipath.

...wasn't that the same reason Bill Paley kept WCBS-TV and WCBS-FM on the ESB for a while after the WTC was completed? My understanding was that reception of both from the WTC at his Connecticut home was bad-to-nonexistent during the initial test transmissions...

 

[kms575]

I think the "new tall building" in question might be One Bryant Park, at 42nd and Sixth. 945 feet to the top of the structure, plus a decorative spire:

http://www.durst.org/i_bp_arch.asp

There won't be any broadcast tenants at One Bryant Park - Durst owns the taller Four Times Square a block away and already has plenty of room for radio and TV up there.

As for the Freedom Tower, it will probably have TV on it whenever it's done. Most of the FM stations can't go down there because of spacing issues, and even the few that could probably won't - the consensus, when WTC was still standing, was that Empire was a better spot for FM.

.....aka Bank of America Building?


I think it's "too crowded" in that spot to distinguish it from 30 miles away. But, from CT, it would be seen this side of Empire, west of Citicorp and Chrysler and just west of 4 Times Square.

 

[VeteranPD]

As I understand it, Bob1370, The fm trasmissions from Empire ARE 50Kw ERP and have been for a long time. The power outputs of the various transmitters are calibrated to yield the same ERP as 50Kw at 500 feet. 105.9 may be an exception to that.

 

[fybush]

As I understand it, Bob1370, The fm trasmissions from Empire ARE 50Kw ERP and have been for a long time. The power outputs of the various transmitters are calibrated to yield the same ERP as 50Kw at 500 feet. 105.9 may be an exception to that.

"ERP" has a specific technical meaning - it's the total power output from the transmitter, minus transmission-line loss, multiplied by the gain (if any) of the transmitting antenna.

For the class B FMs using the master antenna at Empire - that would be 92.3, 93.1, 93.9, 96.3, 97.9, 98.7, 99.5, 100.3, 101.9, 102.7, 103.5, 104.3, 105.1, 106.7 and 107.5 - the ERP is 6000 watts. For the three class B FMs that use the slightly lower "mini-master" antenna - 95.5, 97.1, and 101.1 - it's 6700 watts.

In both cases, that ends up being equivalent, when adjusted for height (the master is 415 meters above average terrain, the mini-master 408 meters), to 50 kW ERP at the standard class B height of 150 meters above average terrain.

But that doesn't make the ERP itself magically become 50 kW - it merely makes the EQUIVALENT coverage the same.

And yes, there is a tradeoff: while that added height allows the Empire FMs to "see" above the forest of lower buildings that make up midtown Manhattan, the lower actual ERP means they don't have quite the "oomph" (that's not a technical term!) to penetrate into buildings as well as they would if they were using higher ERP at lower heights.

There's a real art to understanding that tradeoff, and some of the best FM consulting engineers in the business have made their bones, as it were, by figuring out just how to strike the perfect height/power balance to improve a station's performance. It's different for every market, and sometimes for every station.

 

[Ozman]

Scott,
Thanks for the reply.
I decided to do a Little radio-locator.com research and it seems that even if a station Like 103.5 WKTU would move to New Rochelle on top of of one of the big Buildings 15 miles to the east it seems that the sideband of WNNJ-FM on 103.7 is actually a mile closer 55 miles away instead of the 55-60 or so miles from the current ESB spot which could be the reason IMHO why it has not even been considered. Even if you go further east to stamford WNNJ seems still too close at only 65 miles away and 103.3 WQQQ 58 miles away for KTU to be even be considered for an Upgrade to 100,000 watts with a high antenna. Plus where would you put an antenna of a height of about 1,000 feet to still cover all of the NYC Tri-state even if WKTU were allowed relocation. I'll have to go with the answer of nowhere... "Not in my backyard" I was Just thinking of this as an Idea since WKTU reaches well into CT (almost Hartford) since their is no sideband issues toward Central CT allowing also 103.7 WEEI to reach well into Western CT (except NW corner with WQQQ) as well with the same issue of not having any sideband interference. Just as a side note I wanted to mention I am Just a die hard Hobbyist like some of you out there and I am just putting my feedback in like many others

Scott:
who l gets the top top of the ESB on the Master antenna at 415 meters or are they all in a straight line going across? I always wondered that question and I am sure a few others on the R-I board if are they limited to a little less power by say a few watts than the others on the 415 meter master antenna?

thanks
-OZ

As I understand it, Bob1370, The fm trasmissions from Empire ARE 50Kw ERP and have been for a long time. The power outputs of the various transmitters are calibrated to yield the same ERP as 50Kw at 500 feet. 105.9 may be an exception to that.

"ERP" has a specific technical meaning - it's the total power output from the transmitter, minus transmission-line loss, multiplied by the gain (if any) of the transmitting antenna.

For the class B FMs using the master antenna at Empire - that would be 92.3, 93.1, 93.9, 96.3, 97.9, 98.7, 99.5, 100.3, 101.9, 102.7, 103.5, 104.3, 105.1, 106.7 and 107.5 - the ERP is 6000 watts. For the three class B FMs that use the slightly lower "mini-master" antenna - 95.5, 97.1, and 101.1 - it's 6700 watts.

In both cases, that ends up being equivalent, when adjusted for height (the master is 415 meters above average terrain, the mini-master 408 meters), to 50 kW ERP at the standard class B height of 150 meters above average terrain.

But that doesn't make the ERP itself magically become 50 kW - it merely makes the EQUIVALENT coverage the same.

And yes, there is a tradeoff: while that added height allows the Empire FMs to "see" above the forest of lower buildings that make up midtown Manhattan, the lower actual ERP means they don't have quite the "oomph" (that's not a technical term!) to penetrate into buildings as well as they would if they were using higher ERP at lower heights.

There's a real art to understanding that tradeoff, and some of the best FM consulting engineers in the business have made their bones, as it were, by figuring out just how to strike the perfect height/power balance to improve a station's performance. It's different for every market, and sometimes for every station.

 

[w9wi]

There might even be one or two that have enough space between them and the nearest co-channel or adjacent channel stations to petition for an upgrade to Class C-0 or full C status in purely technical terms, but I don't think the FCC is allowing any more Class C's to be squeezed into the Northeast corridor on top of the grandfathered ones already on the air since the 1950s in New England or upstate New York.

Class C (and its derivatives C0/C1/C2/C3) are not permitted in the NYC market. The country is divided into two Zones, and in Zone I (I know I'm going to get these names backwards!) only Class B (/B1) stations are permitted. In NY State, only the extreme northern part -- well north of Albany -- is in Zone II where Class C stations are permitted.

There are some grandfathered stations upstate, for example in Utica, Syracuse, and Buffalo. They're technically Class B (and are protected from interference as if they were Class B running 50kw) but they're allowed to keep their pre-1964 power levels.

 

[fybush]

Yeah, what w9wi just said...

This topic keeps coming up, and the answer doesn't change: even if you could somehow find the spacing to make it possible, you can't go above class B maximum (50 kW/150 m or equivalent) in most of the northeast or California.

Doug is correct that the only parts of New York state that are class C territory are way up north - in fact, the only full class Cs licensed to New York are WFRY 97.5 in Watertown and WBTZ 99.9 in Plattsburgh. The B/C line slices across Vermont about halfway up (Rutland is in B territory, Burlington's in C-land), cuts across northern NH (WHOM and WPKQ are Cs), and takes in most of Maine except for the Portland area and York County. In fact, the Portland market includes both Bs and Cs; the distinction is based on the transmitter site, not the city of license, so WBLM is a C and WPOR, further south, is a B.

As for the master antenna on ESB: the idea behind a master antenna is that all the signals that use it are combined into a single pipe that feeds the antenna. In the case of Empire, the signals originate in transmitter rooms that are scattered everywhere from the 78th floor up to the 85th floor. All the transmission lines from those rooms go up (or over, in the case of 98.7 and 101.9, which are on 85) to a single room on the 85th floor (you can see pictures here: http://www.fybush.com/site-031120.html) that's full of filters and such.

That's the "combiner" - and what comes out of there is a single fat transmission line carrying the signals of ALL the stations that use the combiner. That line runs up through the airshaft and the old mooring mast to the master antenna, which radiates all the stations from the same pieces of metal.

(It's actually an eight-bay antenna - two rows of panels, on each of the four sides of the tower.)

There is a similar, albeit much smaller, combiner for the "mini-master" on the mezzanine above the 86th floor observation deck.

In other master antenna situations - the Shoreview FM tower in Minneapolis, for instance - the combiner is at ground level, with a transmission line going all the way up the tower from there: http://www.fybush.com/sites/2006/site-060303.html (scroll down...)

(Actually, if you want to get technical about it, the signals for that combiner go DOWN from the transmitter rooms on the first floor to the combiner room in the basement, then back up the tower.)

Combined FM systems are becoming ever more popular, as it becomes ever harder to find tower space for new FM stations.

 

[Ozman]

thanks scott! I always wondered that question. I never knew a Combiner existed until you explained it.