Re: WSRO (CJMS-1280)

[Garrett Wollman <wollman>]

<<On Fri, 15 Oct 1999 09:31:58 -0400 (EWT), Sven Weil <sven@lily.org> said:

> Speaking of defunct canadian AMs, what happened to CJMS 1280?  It's now
> CFMB (multicultural).  CFMB used to be at 1450 or something like
> that.

Here's the scoop....

The original (ten years ago) situation in Montreal was:

	730 - CKAC (Telemedia)
	1280 - CJMS (Radio-Mutuel)
	1410 - CFMB (ethnic)

Back in 1994 or 1995, Telemedia bought out Radio-Mutuel and merged it
with their French-language radio network to form Radio-Media.  By
fiddling the music mix, they were able to keep two FMs in each market
by re-licensing one as an English-language station.  (The canned
``Energie'' and ``Rock-Detente'' formats on Radio-Media's FMs provide
enough flexibility in the playlist so that either format can be run as
either 65% English or 65% French, thus meeting the CRTC's
requirements.)

The same could not be done with the news-talk format, for obvious
reasons.  As a result, whichever of the two stations had the weaker
signal was shut down in each of the duopoly markets.  The owners of
CFMB then bought the facilities of CJMS pending CRTC approval of a
move to 1280.  As of a year ago, the 1410 towers still stood.  (So far
as we can tell, 1470 Pointe-Claire and 1570 Laval are both long gone,
as are the dead Quebec City and Trois-Rivieres stations.)

-GAWollman

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