Big difference when comparing with New York. NYC is 55% Black, Asian and Hispanic. Philly is about 65% white.
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WAXQ
- Thread starter CassChopper96
- Start date
Big difference when comparing with New York. NYC is 55% Black, Asian and Hispanic. Philly is about 65% white.
This has made me listen to Q|WAXQ for the first time in years. I have to admit that it is an interesting blend of rock. Maybe a Jack-esque presentation. I was able to listen to a few of the jocks breaks, but not many. Any info/thoughts the the midday female and afternoon drive male? Obviously, Jim Kerr is the strong glue on the station. How has this station done so well, in the scheme of things, with a bit of an offbeat playlist? Has iHeart left them along on programming, etc? The station is listenable for sure, but quite understated in presentation. Other people have thoughts/opinions on how it sounds?
CassChopper96
Star Participant
Dosent Iheart New Jersey rocker 103.7 NNJ interfer the New York area as well
AceBiscuits
Star Participant
WNNJ is out in Sussex County. Nowhere close to New York. Not to mention that NYC has no signals on that frequency.
There is actually quite a history of what had to actually happen for 103.5 WKTU to make the trip to the Empire State Building. I believe David Eduardo can best elaborate on the history and I recall he may have not so long ago... but needless-to-say that it did take mutual cooperation between WKTU, WNNJ and WPRB to pave the way for that move. I'm thinking maybe WMGM may have also been involved in a fringe fashion as they do have a directional signal towards NYC. I don't think WNNJ was a Chancellor/AM-FM/Clear Channel/iHeart Media station at the time either IIRC...
The antenna has actually bounced around a lot. It started on Long Island, then moved to the Chrysler Building in the mid 60s, then to the World Trade Center in the late 70s, and then after 9-11, it moved to its current spot on the ESB. But the power situation is where I'll defer to others, because I don't believe it was always at its current 6K watts.
As you know, stations in some markets have huge signals based on HAAT. Look at LA. I think it may be time to take the cost savings of electricity into consideration and allow the FCC to let stations operate efficiently from taller towers, as long as the signals stay within the proper radius. Heck, in NYC, the new tall and skinny buildings are going to be taller than the old radio towers. (Then I go off the tracks on how impossible it really is to compete with non-radio music sources when it's nearly impossible to get a clear signal on FM in 2019....)
Stations can already go to whatever is the tallest building or hill or mountain around. Power is adjusted downwards when the "standard" height for the class of station is exceeded.
There is, however, a point where going too high with much lower power is just not the best solution. I was involved with an LA class A that went to a lower mountaintop, but ended up with about 570 watts. It had a bad signal everywhere and did not penetrate. We went to a location where we had 6 kw at conforming height, and the ratings on the signal quadrupled.
When I did due diligence on WTFM in the late 70's, Friendly Frost had it on a separate, directional antenna on one of the WTC towers. The WTC was not an ideal site, since the MSA and the signal did not match as well as the ESB stations did, and it was already known that the station could likely move with some legal and technical negotiations.
When I looked at the facility up on the roof of the WTC tower, they had just begun operating with 3.4 kw, directional @ 1400 feet after moving from the Chrysler Building with, IIRC, 7.1 kw horizontal and slightly less vertical. The ESB common antenna at the time was at about 1220 feet. It eventually increased to about 6 kw on the WTC site, but I believe it was even more directional.
My recollections are based on the period of time when I negotiated a purchase of the station from Friendly Frost until the time that the Pantry Pride/ Food Fair bankruptcy made us forfeit our deposit on WTFM by cancelling the sale agreement (long story of a Supermarket company owning radio stations). They had just moved to the WTC roof, and were doing engineering to increase power. That was in the mid-1978 to early 1979 period IIRC.
Interestingly, we had a contract on WTFM for $7.8 million!
103.5 eventually went non-directional from the WTC master antenna after negotiating mutual interference agreements (and upgrades) with WPRB and WNNJ-FM.
They are now on ESB with the same power as the other full B's.
The only Class B up there that's slightly hemmed in (lower power) at this point, I believe, is 93.1 which is operating under a STA in consideration of 93.1 in Springfield, MA. It would be unrestricted at WTC if they choose to go back there.
They are now on ESB with the same power as the other full B's.
The only Class B up there that's slightly hemmed in (lower power) at this point, I believe, is 93.1 which is operating under a STA in consideration of 93.1 in Springfield, MA. It would be unrestricted at WTC if they choose to go back there.
The areas around NYC that are amenable to Active Rock or Mainstream Rock already have such programming available on the FM dial:
- 94.3 The Shark (Suffolk County / Long Island);
- 89.5 WSOU from Seton Hall University (great station!);
- 105.5 WDHA from Morris County, NJ (a bland station overall, but they do play some harder/newer rock from time to time);
- 95.9 WFOX in Stamford / Norwalk, CT.
Watered down sissy music labeled "alternative rock" doesn't work well in the burroughs of NYC, either. 92.3 needs to take some pointers from 101.9 RXP during its final year or the short-lived (but decently rated) New Rock 101.9. Then again - Entercom doesn't seem to understand what works well in Portland and Seattle doesn't translate to success in other parts of the USA.
Most Entercom-owned alternative stations have terrible ratings. 96.5 The Buzz in Kansas City - a once successful station - has been run into the ground by Entercom's missteps.
- 94.3 The Shark (Suffolk County / Long Island);
- 89.5 WSOU from Seton Hall University (great station!);
- 105.5 WDHA from Morris County, NJ (a bland station overall, but they do play some harder/newer rock from time to time);
- 95.9 WFOX in Stamford / Norwalk, CT.
Watered down sissy music labeled "alternative rock" doesn't work well in the burroughs of NYC, either. 92.3 needs to take some pointers from 101.9 RXP during its final year or the short-lived (but decently rated) New Rock 101.9. Then again - Entercom doesn't seem to understand what works well in Portland and Seattle doesn't translate to success in other parts of the USA.
Most Entercom-owned alternative stations have terrible ratings. 96.5 The Buzz in Kansas City - a once successful station - has been run into the ground by Entercom's missteps.
Given that alt is now a hodge-podge format of various forms of rock, I wonder if the ALT branding doesn't work any more. They might do better building on the K-Rock name. Then again, I can't imagine the audience cares what it's called.
All the ESB stations at 1,362 feet, 13 of them by my quick count, are 6,000 watts except WNYC which is 5,200 and WBLS that is 4,200.
I don't know the exact antenna configurations, but WPAT is the only one listed at 1,421 feet with 5,400 watts, WQXR at 1365 feet and 610 watts and then there are three, WCBS, WPLJ and WQHT at 1339 feet and 6, 700 watts.
The WPAT-FM license record is still for the old 1WTC, because WPAT-FM is still licensed down there; it's been under STA from Empire since 2001, but the STA still needs to be referenced against an actual license, even if the licensed facility no longer exists.
At the actual extant Empire site, there are three operational FM antennas. The 1989-vintage ERI master antenna is a two-bay, four-around panel configuration at 415m HAAT. It's home to 92.3, 93.9, 96.3, 97.9, 98.7, 100.3, 101.9, 102.7, 103.5, 104.3, 105.1, 105.9, 106.7 and 107.5 as licensed operations (all of them at 6 kW ERP except WNYC-FM and WBLS, and of course class B1 WQXR at 610 watts) This master antenna is also used by WPAT-FM under STA with 4 kW, with the instant application requesting 6 kW licensed status. For some reason, WQXR's license record on the master shows 416 meters instead of 415, but this appears to be nothing more than a rounding error. WQXR uses the same combiner into the same master antenna as its 14 bigger sisters.
WNYC-FM and WBLS operate at lower power because of short-spacings that were not grandfathered in. WNYC-FM runs 5200 watts to protect adjacent-channel WZMX 93.7 in Hartford. WBLS runs 4200 watts to protect co-channel WBYN-FM in Pennsylvania. WKTU is short-spaced but has an interference agreement with co-owned WNNJ 103.7 in Newton NJ and with WPRB 103.3 in Princeton.
Just below the two-bay master is a one-bay, four-around ERI panel called the "mini-master." This antenna went in around 2006 to replace separate antennas lower down that had been part of aperture spaces used by the big three TV networks for both their TV and FM O&Os. Because they had access to those spaces, the big three FM O&Os - ABC on 95.5, NBC on 97.1 and CBS on 101.1 - never took part in the consortia that developed the Alford master antenna in the 1960s and then the ERI in the 1980s. The FMs stayed in place even as the TV stations left for 1WTC; after 9/11, Empire again needed more aperture space for TV, and so these three FMs got bumped around a bit until the mini-master was completed.
Near the base of the mast, just above the original roof cone of Empire, there's an even newer ERI panel antenna that was installed just recently as a 19-station aux facility to provide standby capacity for all the FMs on Empire - the 15 on the master, the three on the mini-master and WBAI, which had been on the master but has since left Empire for 4 Times Square. The lower antenna height on the aux (387 m HAAT) corresponds to higher ERP when stations are using it - 7.1 kW for the full class Bs, 6.2 kW for WNYC, 5 kW for WBLS, 710 watts for WQXR.
(Note that because Empire sits basically at sea level and is surrounded by largely flat terrain, HAAT numbers for Empire are almost identical to the height above ground/height above sea level figures; the radiation center for the 1989 master is 413 meters above ground, 429 meters above sea level.)
Hope this helps clear things up - it's actually a surprisingly simple overall configuration these days at Empire, after many many years of constant change. About the only other variable for the Empire FMs is whether and where they have off-site aux facilities.
Thanks for that rundown Scott. I always wondered why there were some variations in power if all the major FM stations in New York are on the same tower. The answer is a few of them must protect other stations nearby. WNYC-FM has adjacent frequency 93.7 WZMX in Hartford. That's odd because most of the other FM signals in Hartford are adjacent to NYC stations, too. And WNYC-FM is among NYC's oldest FM stations, while WZMX only signed on in the 1960s. Plus Waterbury is even closer with adjacent 92.5 and 104.1, while Hamden has adjacent 101.3. But I suppose those stations signed on after their NYC counterparts, so they aren't protected.
WBLS is only powered at 4,200 watts due to co-channel WBYN Boyerstown PA. But WCBS-FM doesn't have to concern itself with co-channel WBEB in Philadelphia (now co-owned, too). They're both grandfathered. And 100.3 WHTZ doesn't have to concern itself with co-channel WRNB Media PA. Since WRNB is relatively new, I guess it must use a directional antenna to protect WHTZ.
It is too bad WQXR 105.9 is so restricted. I'm sure it has plenty of classical music fans who are on the fringes of its signal. While nearly everyone else on the ESB is running 6,000 watts, WQXR is only putting out a tenth of the power. Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, Boston, Seattle and Dallas all have full power FM Classical stations, while NYC has WQXR at 610 watts, plus its 250 watt translator in Westchester County.
WBLS is only powered at 4,200 watts due to co-channel WBYN Boyerstown PA. But WCBS-FM doesn't have to concern itself with co-channel WBEB in Philadelphia (now co-owned, too). They're both grandfathered. And 100.3 WHTZ doesn't have to concern itself with co-channel WRNB Media PA. Since WRNB is relatively new, I guess it must use a directional antenna to protect WHTZ.
It is too bad WQXR 105.9 is so restricted. I'm sure it has plenty of classical music fans who are on the fringes of its signal. While nearly everyone else on the ESB is running 6,000 watts, WQXR is only putting out a tenth of the power. Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, Boston, Seattle and Dallas all have full power FM Classical stations, while NYC has WQXR at 610 watts, plus its 250 watt translator in Westchester County.
The original WQXR had 6000 watts, but that signal was traded for this one ten years ago as part of the deal that brought it under WNYC ownership. There was a similar deal in Boston with WCRB. The classical fans in Boston are still unhappy about that.
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