WATD, WBOQ and WRBB (was Re: WBOQ reach in to Boston)

[Peter Q. George]

Hi Aaron (and crew):
    First, WATD.  I totally agree with you Aaron.  Ed
Perry is excellent in what he does.  He's a great
Consulting Engineer.  Many a college station can, for
the more than likely, can thank Ed for putting their
station on the air and keeping them on the air.  If it
were not Ed and his Educational FM Associates, many of
the 10 watters would have died on the vine after the
1978 ruling that all 10 watters had to increase to 100
watts (Class A) or try to find a spot in Commercial
Band (92.1 - 107.9) and stay at 10 watts.  WATD is a
fine local service operation that super-serves the
entire South Shore area.  It is an Award Winning
operation, literally.  Check the walls of WATD
sometime and you'll see what I mean!  Ed Perry is also
a person who truly enjoys radio, not just for the
money making aspect of it but rather the fun and
excitement of owning a real life FM station. He's a
true radio-junkie, and I mean that in positive sense. 
He's also a very decent person.  I've had many
opportunities to meet with Ed over the past 20 or so
years.  

   As for WBOQ, I truly enjoy the oldies format they
run presently.  It's a great alternative to Oldies
103.3 as they play more of the deeper cuts that WODS
would never play.  I'm sure that "North Shore 104.9"
has a substantial following, North of Boston.  It
covers many sections of the South of Boston area quite
comfortably, as well.

   It's too bad that Northeastern University's WRBB
was not given the opportunity to get WFNX's 101.3
translator operation when 'FNX moved in town.  The
101.3 signal would actually improve WRBB's coverage
all over town, instead of the limited coverage it has
in the Back Bay on 104.9.  It would be nice to see if
'RBB could get some signal improvement by getting the
old 101.3 operation back on-line.  But, that will
probably not happen anytime soon.  In spite of the
limited coverage on 104.9, WRBB "Radio Back Bay" has a
VERY dedicated following in and around the Back Bay. I
belive that they also stream as well.

Oh, well.  That's a 30 for now!

-Pete       

--- Aaron Read <readaaron@friedbagels.com> wrote:

> WBOQ would have a halfway decent Boston reach (at
> least in car radios) 
> if it weren't for WRBB at Northeastern University.
> 
> Of course, WRBB is not going to go anywhere anytime
> soon...Northeastern 
> has invested a fair amount in the studios there
> recently, and the 
> students love having their own station.
> 
> That said, the students, and NEU, are under no
> illusions that their 
> signal is terrible.  It's smacked around by WBOQ,
> WWLI and even WXLO (to 
> some degree) and really smacked down by all the
> blanketing interference 
> from the Pru.
> 
> WRBB certainly wouldn't mind moving to a better
> frequency if the cost to 
> them wasn't outrageous.  Personally if there was
> such a thing as a 
> small, relatively cheap 24/7 AM station for sale in
> Boston, it'd 
> probably be perfect for them.  Get away from that
> blanketing issue anyways.
> 
> Or actually what might be a realistic plan, would be
> for WBOQ to pay for 
> WRBB to rent exclusive use of a Pru FM's HD-2
> multicast channel, with 
> the understanding that within X years (say 5
> years...that's enough for 
> HD radios to start getting on the market) that WRBB
> will abandon 104.9 
> and shut it down, so WBOQ can then get into Boston.
> 
> Or, I wonder if WFNX would particularly mind if WRBB
> moved to 101.3FM? 
> Obviously that's not a great frequency for WRBB -
> it's still got 
> blanketing problems and there's a strong second
> adjacent.  But it can't 
> be worse than 104.9 is.
> 
> -- 
> 
> --------------------------
> Aaron Read
> readaaron@friedbagels.com
> www.friedbagels.com
> Boston, MA 02176
> 
> Fried Bagels - Broadcast Radio & Web
> Engineering & Operations Consultant
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


Peter Q. George (K1XRB)
Whitman, Massachusetts
                           "Scanning the bands since 1967"
radiojunkie1@yahoo.com
radiojunkie3@yahoo.com
***********************************************************

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