HFU HF Underground
General Category => General Radio Discussion => Topic started by: ChrisSmolinski on June 14, 2023, 1658 UTC
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Employees were also informed that Winnipeg's Funny 1290, Calgary's Funny 1060, Edmonton's TSN 1260 Radio, Vancouver's BNN Bloomberg Radio 1410 and Funny 1040, along with London's NewsTalk 1290 would shutter.
https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/BCE-INC-1409161/news/Bell-cutting-1-300-positions-shuttering-six-radio-stations-44112840/?fbclid=IwAR3zje47z3NGizX6gp1_u2A3mqT13FRAjESRhSTBg2mZa2nFQsMGftj_67U
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Great loss and these workforce reduction tactics are synonymous at BCE.
I was one of the senior engineers on the broadcast and network side of Bell until 2012 until my number, along with my co-workers, came up 2 years before being eligible for retirement from BCE. I have been back a few times to some of the facilities which I had designed and built and it was not the same after attrition. The pride was gone and junk was lying around all over the place. At the end of the day, it is all about the stock prices and the big executive bonuses.
Should BCE have ever ventured in the broadcast industry? Probably not. Foremost it is a telephone, commercial video route and data / Internet provider which was hungry at the time to acquire media content rights for their subscribers.
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Music and closedown announcement loop on now, very sad :'( Only Canadian shortwave broadcaster will now be CFRX Toronto on 6070 kHz. I have heard CFVP direct during the day in the winter, I’ll send in my recordings and try for an eQSL.
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CFVP had been on my "try to catch" list for decades, but was never able to make it here through the QRM from Radio Marti and the Cuban Jammers.
I'm not too surprised the stations are going dark, it sounds like they tried to sell them, but found no takers. While those of us in the radio hobby may not want to admit it, AM radio as we know it is dying, and no amount of re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic (changes in programming, more local content, whatever) is going to save it. The operating costs are simply too high.
I'd love to see the AM band allow low power / hobbyists stations as some European countries have done, but the odds of that happening here are about zero.
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I heard CFVP a couple of times during the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, but that was it.
What was the low power HF station that served the Inside Passage and the islands to the north from the city of Vancouver? They ran low power but I could hear them every morning in the Appalachians. Their transmitter gave up the ghost, but a bunch of hams got together and modified a Kenwood rig to specs they thought the radio board would accept? The board shot it down because it couldn't do the Hokey-Pokey or some other damned nonsense.
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CKFX 6080 in Vancouver relayed CKWX 1130 with about 10 watts. Logged that as a teen from suburban Seattle back in 1987.
There also was CKZU 6160, which relayed CBU 690 with about 500 watts from Vancouver. That one lasted until the 2010s.
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... it was not the same after attrition. The pride was gone and junk was lying around all over the place. At the end of the day, it is all about the stock prices and the big executive bonuses.
yup :(
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I heard CFVP a couple of times during the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, but that was it.
What was the low power HF station that served the Inside Passage and the islands to the north from the city of Vancouver? They ran low power but I could hear them every morning in the Appalachians. Their transmitter gave up the ghost, but a bunch of hams got together and modified a Kenwood rig to specs they thought the radio board would accept? The board shot it down because it couldn't do the Hokey-Pokey or some other damned nonsense.
I think you're talking about the CBC outlet on 6160 which relayed 690 khz out of Vancouver. There was a transmitter fire, and 690 dropped from 50KW to 10KW and the SW transmitter on 6160 was never restored to the airwaves.
The 6160 khz relay was readily audible at least 200 mi away. One night I heard them and CKZN Newfoundland at the same time, all on a DX-350 off the whip. That was around 2012 or so, when the sunspots were better than they are now.
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Wow. Just another wonderful day in the radio industry.
Very surprised that Edmonton's 1260 ESPN (CFRN, which gets out into the States very well) sports talker will be shut down. Sports is a big deal in Edmonton, and there can't be too many sports talkers up there. Oh well.
So much for the radio experts always saying that a station can do fine if it has low ratings, because they have a lock on some demographic.
The latest ratings figures I could find CFRN pulled a 1.3, 23K cume. Higher than many US sports talkers, comparitively. And CFRN is apparently the only sports station in that metro. Well, I guess it's bye bye.
Radio continues in its downward spiral. A slow one, but it's circling the drain. Sad especially for radio fans.
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Still miss CFCF on 6005 kHz... my first DX station as a kid. :)
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CFCF via CFCX on 6005 khz....Me too, Sig!
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Another Canadian Connection - I am pretty sure my first DX station was the CBC Northern Service, at least that was my first QSL.
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Another Canadian Connection - I am pretty sure my first DX station was the CBC Northern Service, at least that was my first QSL.
Mine was probably Radio RSA, which would come in on my old, upright multiband tube radio in the afternoons.
I remember CBC Northern Service. They'd even broadcast in native languages, which were pretty cool to hear.