The future of RTE Radio 1 LW

Deleted User wrote: »

Stations should be allowed to do what they want anyway , too many restrictions.

This. Crazy that news, "current affairs" (i.e. mindless vox pops), Irish, etc. are forced onto music stations when there are specialist stations for talk and the Irish language already.

marno21 wrote: »

4FM are only licenced for Dublin + commuter belt, Cork, Limerick, Clare and Galway

Didn't realise their broadcast area was so limited. Could they apply to go nationwide ? Wasnt Newstalk a bit like that in its early days and then went nationwide?

Why RTE Radio 1 on long-wave are currently off the air? There is some maintenance or that's an technical fault? The carrier went down at 9:19 am.

Some longwave broadcasting tidbits that are semi-relevant to this thread.

* The 153 kHz transmitter in Ingoy, Finnmark, Norway, which carried the NRK P1 service with local opt-out, closed down a few minutes after midnight (local time) on the 2nd December. This was after a consultation earlier in the year that proposed to close the TX down which had received no objections. Originally installed in 2000, the site lies on the northern Norwegian coast in the Arctic circle and it appears that its original purpose is regarded as redundant with DAB deemed to provide good coverage on land and approx. 80km out from the shore, with most Norwegian shipping in the Barnets Sea further away using on-board DTH satellite for reception via 5E or 1W. This now leaves the 1485 kHz TX near Longyearbyen on the Svalbard archipelago as the sole NRK analogue terrestrial outlet - this had also been subject to a proposal for closing at the same time as 153 kHz, but NRK received feedback that the 1485 kHz outlet was still being used by a significant number of listeners, particularly in parts of Svalbard outside of Longyearbyen, so this is not only planned to stay on air but also have its TX facilities upgraded (the current facilities were installed in the 1960's) with its ERP increased from 1kW to 3kW.

As a result of NRK now vacating 153 kHz, the last remaining broadcast TX on this channel is Antenna Satelor from Romania.

* Reports from Eastern Europe have noted that Watan Radio from Turkmenistan on 279 kHz had gone off the air earlier this month. It's not sure wherever it is a permenant close down, or wherever repairs/upgrades are being carried out. This TX is difficult to observe in Ireland given its distance, and that there aren't any online SDR tuners located in the region which could receive the station on a consistent basis, but reports over the last several years noted that it was suffering from problems regarding low modulation levels. The 150kW TX is located near the capital city, Ashgabat - if it is off the air for good, then it will have been the last LW broadcast to have come out from the former Soviet Union, as well as the last broadcast to use the 279 kHz channel.

* Meanwhile on the French/German border, Europe 1 is to close down its transmissions on 183 kHz at midnight (local time) on 31st December according to reports on Ydun's Medium Wave site (mediumwave.info). The TX is located in Flensburg, Saarland, pretty much literally just over the border from France. Earlier this decade, a collapse of one of the masts forced the station to run at reduced power that later saw a partial refurbishment in 2014 that included moving the transmitter into a new, much smaller containment unit well away from the original grand transmission building. Well, after France Inter vacating 162 kHz about three years ago it was a question of which of the three French language commercial stations on LW would blink first about also shutting down, and it appears that feedback from a temporary LW TX shutdown a few months ago (or lack of) plus a crises at the station, with some of its worst listener figures ever recorded, has forced Europe 1's hand. The LW facilities of them as well as RTL and RMC were in the last couple of decades primarily there to fill in voids of FM coverage for each station in Metropolitan France, but it seems the LW transmissions now attract very few listeners on their own. After Europe 1 leaves LW, it must be asked how long will RTL (234 kHz) and RMC (216 kHz) will keep their facilities going as to its cost effectiveness? All three stations are to be accommodated on a new DAB+ national multiplex in France that is due to start rolling out in 2020, and which is planned to give coverage in much of rural France (as opposed to the general FM frequency planning that concentrates frequencies in the main cities at the expense of suburban and rural coverage) so it is very likely a question of when rather than if.

When 183 kHz is switched off, it'll leave a gap between 171 kHz (Medi 1, Morocco) and 189 kHz (RAS 1&2, Iceland) on the band, with Germany no longer using 177 kHz and no outlets any more on 180 kHz either.

Medium wave transmissions from the UK are about to take a hit on two fronts...

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1. The BBC are to close 18 MW transmitters that carry either Radio Scotland, Radio Wales or BBC local radio in England. The announcement came from an engineering blog post that stated that 18 sites were to close, with some stations losing all MW coverage and other having theirs reduced. The following seems to tally with the announcement as no transmitter sites or frequencies were explicitly named, and will presumably be known later.

Figure in brackets is listed transmission power (in some cases they might be running less power than this in recent years).

BBC Radio Scotland

* 585 kHz Dumfries (2kW)
* 810 kHz Redmoss (5kW)

Notes: 585 kHz used to carry the old Radio Solway opt-out, whilst the 810 kHz Redmoss outlet carried the "National" service whilst 990 kHz at the same site had the old Radio Aberdeen opt-out. When R. Aberdeen closed, 990 kHz began broadcasting BBC Radio nan Gaidheal until it was shut down three(?) years ago. MW service to continue from the high power TXs at Westerglen & Burghead (both 100kW).

BBC Radio Wales

* 882 kHz Forden (1kW)
* 882 kHz Tywyn (5kW)
* 1125 kHz Llandrydrodd Wells MF (1kW)

Notes: An expansion of Radio Wales' FM coverage in 2019 by taking over BBC Radio 3 frequencies in many parts of the country now means the amount of places in Wales that can only receive the station terrestrially via MW and not FM or DAB has been drastically reduced. Three sites are to remain on air - Washford (100kW) and Penmon (10kW) on 882 kHz, as well as the old Radio Clwyd outlet in Wrexham (2kW) on 657 kHz.

BBC Radio Cornwall

* 630 kHz Redruth MF (2kW)
* 657 kHz Bodmin (0.5kW)

Notes: Radio Cornwall is to cease broadcasting on MW.

BBC Radio Cumbria

* 1458 kHz Whitehaven MF (0.5kW)

Notes: MW TXs at Carlisle (756 kHz, 1kW) and Barrow (837 kHz, 1kW) will remain.

BBC Radio Merseyside

* 1485 kHz Wallasey (2kW)

Notes: Radio Merseyside is to cease broadcasting on MW. A few years back this TX was temporarily "switched off", broadcasting a rolling announcement for a few weeks as part of a test, and from feedback it was one of the most complained about stations from those whom couldn't listen to it. However most of the complaints were resident on the North Wales coast, outside the editorial area, from Scousers whom had moved to there. Such listeners will have to now access the station via the internet.

BBC Radio Newcastle

* 1458 kHz Newcastle aka Wrekenton (2kW)

Notes: Radio Newcastle is to cease broadcasting on MW

BBC Radio Norfolk

* 855 kHz Postwick (2kW)

Notes: The 873 kHz outlet at West Lynn (0.3kW) is to remain on air

BBC Radio Solent

* 999 kHz Fareham (1kW)
* 1359 kHz Bournemouth aka Fern Barrow (0.85kW)

Notes: Radio Solent is to cease broadcasting on MW

BBC Three Counties Radio

* 630 kHz Luton (0.2kW)
* 1161 kHz Bedford aka Kempston (0.1kW)

Notes: 3CR is to cease broadcasting on MW

BBC Radio York

* 666 kHz Fulford (0.5kW)
* 1260 kHz Scarborough (0.5kW)

Notes: Radio York is to cease broadcasting on MW

https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/8bda7cd8-fdf8-41f5-8f3c-212cf5f7c86f

The MW/LW outlets for BBC Radios 4, 5, Ulster and other local stations in England will still remain on-air... for now.

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2. Ofcom have granted permission to Talk Sport to close down seven of its low-powered TXs.

On 1053 kHz: Derry (1kW), Plumers Barracks (Plymouth, 1kW), Pearce's Hill (Exeter, 1kW), Rosemarkie (Inverness, 1kW).

On 1089 kHz: Redruth MF (2kW), Redmoss MF (Aberdeen, 2.2kW)

On 1107 kHz: Occombe (Torbay, 1kW)

No date has yet been announced for closure of the above sites, but Talk Sport's MW daytime population coverage will reduce from 95% to 93.4%.

(Personal note - the 1053 kW TX in Derry was always woeful in its coverage, it barely made it out of the city. Then again, Sherrifs Mountain has never been a good site for medium wave transmissions)

Anyone know if listeners in N. Ireland to R. Scotland 810 MW and Radio Wales 882 MW will now lose signal altogether or are these still going to be available as I'm not sure exactly which transmitters they're coming from.?

It looks like Long Wave 252 has won over DAB radio in Ireland. The DAB service is to be switched off next month (April 2020). Many people are glad to see the back of the digital format, yet many people want to RTE to retain RTE Gold, an impossible situation, only chance is to keep it online and saorview platforms. In the hight of RTE cut backs I'm surprised they are keeping Long Wave going into the future. A campaign was had to keep LW 252 but no effort is made to keep Digital radio/Gold.

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Gold is one of RTE's best stations, I think 2fm should be the new Gold slot as it's a youth focused station and it isn't doing particularly well to be honest, It would be better catering for the 30+.

In an ideal world, LW 252 would go back to 567 Khz at 500 Kw I think it was.

LW 252 for Gold. But I would rather see the closure of 252 and see 567 Mw come back online as a lot more radios have MW than LW.

A DAB infrastructure would cost millions, the quality is crap and it offers nothing better than FM these days because FM radios today also don't have to be tuned which was one of RTE's selling points with DAB as if tuning a radio was a bad thing, they tried to sell "digital" as being better than FM. It didn't work because DAB doesn't offer anything neat the benefits that digital TV does. Though in the earlier days digital TV quality was crap due to the over use of compression, sky TV SD was absolute crap.

DAB quality is still poor because it was never updated and the commercial stations have no interest in DAB because why spend money when FM does the job and everyone is happy with FM.

As of now I absolutely agree with you, of course. Tullamore 567 khz should be reopened, it should have never been shut. RTE Gold on Long Wave is a different story though. RTE announced so many cut backs that none of the two above will ever happen. I agree 2fm is terrible and if any chance should merge with the great RTE Gold.