as mentioned on the other message board "Crawford BSTG has turned in the license of 50 Kw 1540 WDCD, Albany (once WPTR). The station has been off air for about 11 months and won't be back. One of the biggest AM signals to drop out so far." wonder if someone will bring back a new station on 1540 ?
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WDCD 1540 Turns In License
- Thread starter xmradiopro
- Start date
Thanks for noticing this. I revised the title of the thread.
sorry, i had thought it was that...
My guess is at 50kW they weren't billing nearly enough to pay the electric bill.
Fond memories of WPTR during my daze in Southboro, MA. Picking up WMEX at night was dicey, but PTR came in quite well. The FCC shot down Crawford's STA to downgrade the power on a technicality, but left the door open for further review: http://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/getimportletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=79281 Crawford elected not to take the Commission up, and subsequently threw in the towel...and license!
Back in the '60s, in my neck of the woods (central NH).....after sunset we had our pick of Top 40 (AM!) stations to listen to ---WABC (770), WINS (1010), WOWO (1190), WDRC (1360), WPOP (1410), WKBW (1520) and WPTR (1540)...
Throw in a couple of regional (5kw) outlets (1250 and 1370, Manchester).....and you were good to go all night long!!
By now, you all should know..... Oldies (50s and 60s) is my forte....the "creme de la creme" is what I shoot for every Saturday from 9 AM to 1 PM on my little Part 15 station....my audience may not be the biggest (I'm not ready to "buy a Book"....!!)
but the few that DO listen are dedicated Oldies fans, like me......and NOT ALL ARE OVER 55 YEARS OLD!!
Really sad to see an institution like WPTR go away like this...luckily, we DO have a few air checks around to remind us of ".....those thrilling days of yesteryear.....!!"
Still a little unclear about Albany's 1540...does this mean no one else can apply and put another station on this frequency?
You can, but why would you want to? youd have to wait till the next filing window, who knwos when that'll be.. and oyu'd have to put up multiple towers, which are expensive.. WDCD was grandfathered so a new station would have to protect someone that WDCD didnt have to.. possibly.
They'd definitely have to protect Radio Bahamas and KXEL Waterloo IA. Both run 50 kW. Don't know about anyone else.
We already know they have to protect ZNS1 and KXEL.. but being as old as it was There are some stations that probably came on after WDCD that it doesnt have to protect but a new 1540 would.
In addition to the co-channel stations, you have first, second and third channel adjacent stations to take into consideration. Plus FCC regulations are a lot tougher than when 15~Forty was first licensed to run 50kw. Wonder if a new owner could have downgraded to lower power; go non-D, and snag a translator? That might have been money better spent than trying to run it as a pure 50kw station.
There's CHIN 1540 in Toronto which would need protection for sure. 1530 and 1550 don't seem to have anything new, I didn't look at further adjacencies.
The question is whether anyone will find value in this facility in Albany. Since the licensee didn't sell it, I guess the answer is no.
The question is whether anyone will find value in this facility in Albany. Since the licensee didn't sell it, I guess the answer is no.
I wonder if this will be an opportunity for formerly co-channel stations like WXEX 1540 Exeter, NH to increase power. With 1 tower at 5,000 watts their critical hours are 2500w and night power of 3 whopping watts. Depends on who they have to protect.
WOW!!! Never knew WXEX (formerly WKXR....LONG AGO!!) went to 5 kw......
Last time I visited there......they were running 1 kw from a Bauer 707 to a shunt-fed tower on Downing Court....they exited at sunset: never attempted to run the 3 watts!!!
And their FM (WKXR-FM 107.1) was run from the same location, using 4 bays side-mounted on the AM tower, fed with an RCA BTF-1D!!!
Far cry from WERZ (Z107) today.....!!!
Ummmmm... Did I mention it's been "awhile" since I got down that way???! And I'm only 45 miles out.....
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