Three KVOQ call signs on FM in the Denver area?

Something odd that was pointed out to me by a friend, and I am at a loss to explain it, but apparently there are three different stations in Colorado with the KVOQ call sign. How can this be?

I understand 102.3 KVOQ-FM is one (sharing the calls with an AM in Denver) and it has a booster that's called KVOQ-FM2. So why did a (silent) station on 88.7 in Estes Park receive the KVOQ (no -FM suffix) calls on the 31st of July? That has me scratching my head.

Is this another FCC goof or something else? The Estes Park station is not even owned by the same organization as the "main" KVOQ, Colorado Public Radio.

It'd be understandable if the FCC was now sharing calls between non-comms and commercials stations but in this case both are non-comms.

tomservo said:

Something odd that was pointed out to me by a friend, and I am at a loss to explain it, but apparently there are three different stations in Colorado with the KVOQ call sign. How can this be?

I understand 102.3 KVOQ-FM is one (sharing the calls with an AM in Denver) and it has a booster that's called KVOQ-FM2. So why did a (silent) station on 88.7 in Estes Park receive the KVOQ (no -FM suffix) calls on the 31st of July? That has me scratching my head.

Is this another FCC goof or something else? The Estes Park station is not even owned by the same organization as the "main" KVOQ, Colorado Public Radio.

It'd be understandable if the FCC was now sharing calls between non-comms and commercials stations but in this case both are non-comms.

Click to expand...

Well Tom, if I'm reading the FCC rap sheet correctly on KVOQ, the KVOQ-2 licensed to Boulder is a 40 watt booster. Its use is to fill in areas that the main KVOQ signal does not reach, or has difficulties reaching the area in which the booster is located. It can't extend KVOQ's coverage, only assist in covering the areas where the primary is weak.

We have a booster here in Houston as well. KQBU-1 is a booster located in NE Houston, used (or was used) to assist the main signal coming at us from Devers. They both share the KQBU calls, the booster is licensed as -1. Combined with the co-owned AM in El Paso, there are 3 separate facilities utilizing the KQBU calls here in Texas.

Hope that helps...

I understand the booster - it's the separate station on 88.7 with the same calls that is the mystery.

Well, you did latch onto part of the problem, Tom.

The Greenwood Village station is KVOQ-FM and the Estes Park one is KVOQ, as you pointed out. Technically, under FCC rules those are two different call signs (the same base four-letters, with and without suffix), and the usual process for multiple stations to use the same base call requires that the second station be a different service than the one which already has it ... but the "-FM" suffix already existing seems to have confused that process.

So I did a little detective work and here is what I think happened:
KVOQ at 1340 in Denver changed calls to KDCO on July 15, concurrent with an ownership change (to the people who own 88.7). 102.3 had just taken the KVOQ-FM calls on April 29, so I presume that was in preparation for the AM leaving.

The problem is that the KDCO calls were on 88.7 prior to all this, and I think they were supposed to change to KDCO-FM with the ownership change but KVOQ-FM applied to drop the -FM suffix concurrently and 88.7 ended up with the wrong calls.

My guess is that the Media Bureau will straighten the whole thing out, and this will be the result:
KDCO at 1340
KDCO-FM at 88.7
KVOQ (no suffix) at 102.3

Too much happened at once, which increased the possibility of Murphy helping with the paperwork.

That sounds entirely logical, and we know the FCC isn't always on the ball with mistakes. (I've long laughed at their inability to know where the Mississippi River is, since they have assigned several K-calls to the state of Mississippi and Michigan over the last few years.)

I vaguely remember this question from years ago but don't recall an answer.

Are there any markets along the Mississippi that have clusters of matching calls?
i.e. WXYZ (AM); WXYZ-FM; WXYZ-LP; WXYZ-DT (LD, CD, etc...) and KXYZ (AM); KXYZ-FM; KXYZ-LP; KXYZ-DT (LD, CD, etc...)

Is here any set of call letters in the U.S. That has all variations in use?

In Northeastern Minnesota, there is KMFG and WMFG/WMFG-FM which are owned by the same company.