WMEX Updates??

[Deleted User]

As for finding a site for WMEX, are there any decommissioned former AM sites around Boston? I seem to recall one, on a dead end street somewhere in the 'burbs, but can't recall what station it was. 1570 Beverly, perhaps?

1570's tower was at Endicott College , and you are not going to get any sort of AM with more than a KW of power into a residential neighborhood in a suburb with enough money to tie you up in litigation forever.

They had enough trouble running flea power out of Endicott, the natives were not going to allow a huge antenna farm and transmitter there

 

[Voicetrack of Reason]

The station I'm thinking of was not at any college. It was out in the boondocks somewhere. Dead end street. Swampy area. There was an old studio building out there. It appeared to have been damaged by fire. This was several years ago.

Thanks for the tutorial on NIMBY's. I'm quite familiar with them, having been in the tower business for 25+ years.

WMEX is quite the complex puzzle. I'm not sure these Daly XXL folks fully understood what they were getting themselves into.

 

[raccoonradio]

WNSH tower used to be off Endicott St in Danvers near the now out of business movie theatre complex (Needham St?) Studios were nearby at one time..maybe back when they were WBVD.Kids used to smoke near there, and there was a fire.

Fire was in 92 I believe. Fybush's North East Radio Watch, 2002:"Up in Beverly, WNSH (1570) is trying to end years and years of STA (Special Temporary Authority) operation, stemming from the 1992 fire that destroyed the old 1570 (WMLO/WBVD) site in Danvers. WNSH has been running with 500 watts daytime from a new three-tower array on the Endicott College ...WNSH was operating with an STA to transmit non-directionally from the middle tower of the new day array, having concluded that it couldn”t win political permission to build the extra towers needed for full night power from Endicott. "

So that was the dead end street, swampy area, but it did go to Endicott College later.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

For discontinued sites, don't know if they could use the former original WNTN site. The tower is still there for now, but I think someone wants to do something else with the land and property.

It's only one tower, so it couldn't be directional from there. It could maybe have a fair day signal from there, but it would have to go low power at night where it would get eaten up by the strong adjacent skywaves from Wash. DC and Buffalo.

Could they afford to piggyback onto (rent) any other currently operating AM station sites around greater Boston that could work technically?

 

[Deleted User]

Could they afford to piggyback onto (rent) any other currently operating AM station sites around greater Boston that could work technically?

Given the complexity of their protection requirements, they would need a multiple tower array, WUNR comes to mind, but that site was a complicated array in order to get the other stations needs met, and I don't know if they could get another signal out of there and not impact the existing iirc 3 stations.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

What about the WWDJ 1150/WAZN 1470 site in Lexington? It's only a couple of miles from their Waltham site. Would 1510 be too close to 1470?

 

[DavidEduardo]

What about the WWDJ 1150/WAZN 1470 site in Lexington? It's only a couple of miles from their Waltham site. Would 1510 be too close to 1470?

Waaaay to close.

 

[nowradioguy]

Yeah, it looks that way....it's unfortunate because she's a good broadcaster....I know she is helping Joe Shortsleeve with his campaign for Senate but I was hoping she would show up somewhere on the dial long before now. Maybe now with all the switching around of radio stations going on, perhaps RKO will get rid of that noon to three clown and put her in his place!

Had another thought earlier this evening; to wit, perhaps WKOX 1430 could drop Glen Beck and put Sandy on from 9:00 AM till noon. Yes, I know, Beck's program is an "in-house" production, but, come on, Sandy can run circles around Glen. After all, Sandy is no-nonsense who simply doesn't do BS.

And, FWIW, 1430's 5000-watt daytime signal has gotten better up here in the Merrimack Valley.

 

[nowradioguy]

the only value it has would be for a co-channel or first adjacent to buy the license to take it dark or downgrade the signal so they could upgrade an existing station

Why should someone be able to buy a station's license and and then take it dark? I thought a frequency allocation was "public property" in the sense that, if an owner decides he doesn't want to operate thereon any longer, others are allowed to bid for it. Did the rules change along the way so that the owner of a channel could take it dark and get that frequency allocation deleted for that locale? Am I missing something?

 

[Deleted User]

Why should someone be able to buy a station's license and and then take it dark? I thought a frequency allocation was "public property" in the sense that, if an owner decides he doesn't want to operate thereon any longer, others are allowed to bid for it. Did the rules change along the way so that the owner of a channel could take it dark and get that frequency allocation deleted for that locale? Am I missing something?

like all the TV stations that just cashed in on the spectrum auction?

like I Heart downgrading a RI signal so they could upgrade 101.7?

What was the AM down near Brockton taken dark so an AM on the north shore could upgrade.

 

[Mediaace]

The “swampy” area WNSH transmitted from in Danvers was a two-tower operation at 500 watts in a decrepit building located at the end of Clinton Avenue across the freeway from the former movie theater. Like Raccoon stated a carelessly discarded cigarette ignited an old couch on the upper floor in 1991. I am thinking it was in December (I maybe wrong!). The building was fully engulfed upon the firefighters arrival. The irony was the transmitter suffered water damage from the fire getting put out as water seeped through the floor into the cabinet. I imagine it suffered a fair amount of smoke damage in the process. One of the two towers was down shortly there after. The facility had weeds and grass growing everywhere the past few years they operated there. Not sure of the current state of the property.

 

[Mediaace]

The station near Brockton you maybe thinking of, MRBIboredop was 1570 WPEP/Taunton. They were taken dark as part of the 1570 WNSH/Beverley (now 1570 WMVX/Methuen) upgrade.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

Had another thought earlier this evening; to wit, perhaps WKOX 1430 could drop Glen Beck and put Sandy on from 9:00 AM till noon. Yes, I know, Beck's program is an "in-house" production, but, come on, Sandy can run circles around Glen. After all, Sandy is no-nonsense who simply doesn't do BS.

Aren't all of WKOX's regular full-time hosts (besides a few brokered weekend shows) nationally syndicated by the owner iHeart's Premiere Networks, so that they don't have to pay any of them locally? Putting Sandy on weekdays would mean that they would have to put someone on-air on the local payroll.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

like all the TV stations that just cashed in on the spectrum auction?

like I Heart downgrading a RI signal so they could upgrade 101.7?

What was the AM down near Brockton taken dark so an AM on the north shore could upgrade.

Don't forget the once-legendary former blowtorch of the eastern USA 1190 AM WOWO Ft. Wayne, Indiana being downgraded at night by the owners of WLIB in NYC so they could expand its night signal.

 

[TheOtherBigJohn]

Don't forget the once-legendary former blowtorch of the eastern USA 1190 AM WOWO Ft. Wayne, Indiana being downgraded at night by the owners of WLIB in NYC so they could expand its night signal.

If my memory serves me, the former owners of WLIB "Inner City" (now bankrupt) purchased WOWO with the sole intention of downgrading it and upgrading WLIB. After they downgrade, they sold WOWO.

And the band played on.

 

[Deleted User]

The station near Brockton you maybe thinking of, MRBIboredop was 1570 WPEP/Taunton. They were taken dark as part of the 1570 WNSH/Beverley (now 1570 WMVX/Methuen) upgrade.

Thanks, I could not remember the calls for the life of me.

 

[nowradioguy]

like all the TV stations that just cashed in on the spectrum auction?

like I Heart downgrading a RI signal so they could upgrade 101.7?

What was the AM down near Brockton taken dark so an AM on the north shore could upgrade.

It was the FCC who initiated the spectrum auction to take various UHF channels dark to free up space for wireless; so, not a fair comparison.

iHat downgrades Providence's 101.5 for its Boston 101.7; bad enough, but at least it didn't take 101.5 or 101.9 dark. (Yet.)

WOWO and WBAI were, unfortunately for WOWO, co-owned. And then WBAI's owner ditches WOWO; nice. NOT! Ruin a once-great station and then run from the scene. (I hope iHat doesn't get any ideas to do the same to 101.5 or 101.9.)

The two 1570 allocations were also co-owned; here is where things got crazy.

Just musing here: if one had a really, really, really large pile of cash, and offered it to the owner/operator of a station he disliked, who accepted it, could he then take that station dark? Or does one just have to mimic WMEX' last owner/operator; i.e., with next to no money, run a station into the ground and leave it at the point where it just could get taken dark.

 

[nowradioguy]

Aren't all of WKOX's regular full-time hosts (besides a few brokered weekend shows) nationally syndicated by the owner iHeart's Premiere Networks, so that they don't have to pay any of them locally? Putting Sandy on weekdays would mean that they would have to put someone on-air on the local payroll.

Eli, you're right; why would iHat want to put anyone live/local on one of its stations? I forgot; they don't have much $$$ with which to play.

 

[Mediaace]

Thanks, I could not remember the calls for the life of me.

Anytime!

 

[DavidZ]

If the cross-ownership rules are changed by the FCC as expected at their next meeting, would the Herald try to buy WMEX bringing it back as an outlet for Herald radio?