Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Radio Stations

Dravecky

I just wanted to take a moment to remember our good friend and a driving force behind this project, and others, Dravecky. We lost him 4 years ago today, April 23.

An admin, he was honored with 3 good articles and 145 DYKs, plus he had 104,715 edits to his name, including one (his last) the morning he passed. Dravecky was a friend to all, on and off Wikipedia. A SciFi fan above all else. He helped do the behind the scenes stuff (along with his longtime girlfriend Robyn) for FenCon, WhoFest, among many others and met many of his favorite actors and actresses. He loved his University of Alabama Crimson Tide football.

I think I can speak for everyone when I say he is still missed by all here. Roll Tide, Dravecky. :) - Neutralhomer • Talk • 15:39 on April 23, 2020 (UTC) • #StayAtHome

Requested move at Talk:SBS Radio#Requested move 7 April 2023

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:SBS Radio#Requested move 7 April 2023 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Yours sincerely, TechGeek105 (his talk page) 23:57, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Greatest Hits Radio

Per the RfC in 2021 on the subject, articles about British local radio stations which were relaunched as part of the Greatest Hits Radio network in 2020/21 should "end their scope prior to the GHR rollup" and serve as historical documentation of the local radio station in question prior to its rebrand. Work to fix some of the hasty edits around the time of the rebrand is ongoing (and almost complete).

A user, User:Socialist Distancing, who has a large number of edits on UK radio-related articles, has recently been going around changing these pages back to names under the Greatest Hits Radio hierarchy, as in this edit where The Revolution (radio station) was renamed in the body text to "Greatest Hits Radio Manchester & The North West (Oldham)". See also: Peak FM; Dream 100; Signal 107. This goes against the 2021 RfC and is generally messy - the user appears to be using a crude search-and-replace in some cases leading to descriptions of Greatest Hits Radio broadcasting local programming that it does not (but that the former local stations did) such as sports coverage.

The user almost never uses edit summaries and is not communicative - they never reply to talk page messages or polite requests from fellow editors regarding their editing behavior. Could other editors keep an eye out for this user's edits and revert where necessary to maintain the status quo regarding these Greatest Hits Radio articles? Flip Format (talk) 19:32, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Number of radio stations

Hello. Is Radio Locator (Theodric Technologies) considered a reliable source? I would like to use it in Minneapolis#Media to replace Nielsen. The Nielsen page is no longer accessible and using it in the Internet Archive results in an error. As a visitor, I don't know if the link which I found under Resources at WikiProject Radio is for convenience, or if it is a reliable reference. If it's not, could you suggest a better source? Thank you. -SusanLesch (talk) 19:39, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

UK radio navboxes

Just a quick thought regarding the UK radio navboxes that I've been updating lately. Currently, these are in a strange order - AM, then FM, then DAB. For several years (per RAJAR) DAB has been the most popular platform for radio listening in terms of listening hours, followed by FM, with AM almost unmeasurably small.

Should these navboxes reflect the reality of modern broadcasting, with DAB placed at the top of each navbox, then FM, then what's left on AM at the bottom? Flip Format (talk) 19:34, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Radio market template standards

I have recently done a fair amount of work on Template:Tyler-Longview Radio (specifically, bringing its content in line with the actual market of the same name). Before I continue my work improving other market templates, I wanted to attempt to get some discussion going about creating some standards around these boxes - how some things are named, how various cases are handled, etc. I am primarily concerned with US stuff, but consideration should certainly be made for other countries as well.

Questions on which I would like to find consensus include:

• How should the template be titled consistently, not in the page name but across the top of the box?
• Should further efforts be made toward a goal of one market = one template? (affects previous question)
  • My vote would be yes - I would like to see that happen.
• How should we represent multiple, non-overlapping stations in one market sharing the same frequency?
  • My solution to this was to add the licensed city name outside of the link tag after the frequency in parentheses, and if two stations are of the same class, I'd just repeat the frequency again, linked to the other station, and add the city name as before. However, I have noticed that other templates do it differently, such as: frequency (callsign1 - callsign2). I prefer the idea of using city names, because if you're already looking at a "by frequency" list, IMO you're probably more likely to care about where said frequency can be tuned into rather than what the call sign is.
• Would it be a good idea to consistently add city names to the NOAA stations, either 100% of the time, or only when there are 2 or more?

-Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 19:41, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Replying and adding on...

• To the first question, my initial thought is it should match the Nielsen market name, as shown at List of United States radio markets. I'm assuming you're looking primarily at U.S. radio market templates, right? Or would you see these rolling out to similar templates like {{Toronto Radio}} or {{London radio}} too?
• The goal of one market = one template seems reasonable, mostly because I can't think of a case where it wouldn't be off the top of my head.
• Regarding multiple stations at a frequency, I understand the logic of including city names, but would probably lean towards the callsign instead because in my mind the dial position is more about which station is there than the city of license.
• Unsure about adding city names to the NOAA stations. It takes up relatively little space on the template, so there's room to do it without things looking more crowded.

Since you're opening questions about radio market templates, how should we handle digital radio? For the U.S., since we're really only talking about HD Radio at this point, would it be too crowded to blend digital radio with the (analog) AM/FM stations?

So, instead of two sections:

By FM frequency:

• • 87.7
  • 88.5
  • 89.3
  • 89.9
  • 90.1
  • 90.5
  • 90.9
  • ...

Digital radio by frequency & subchannel:

• • 88.5-1
  • 88.5-2
  • 89.3-1
  • 90.9-1
  • 90.9-2
  • ...

You'd have something like:

By FM frequency & digital subchannel:

• • 87.7
  • 88.5 (HD-1, HD-2)
  • 89.3 (HD-1)
  • 89.9
  • 90.1
  • 90.5 (HD-1, HD-2)
  • ...

— Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 20:37, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

• Yes, primarily US markets. I haven't yet looked into how it could apply elsewhere.
• There are currently some market templates that, for example, split up one real market on the basis of multiple MSAs. This was the case with the one I just worked on, where there was one for stations in Tyler and surrounding areas, and a separate one for a so-called Longview-Marshall "market". I combined the two and made the latter a redirect. Also, there is a template for Paris, TX, which is not in a proper radio market -- how should those situations be handled? I feel like making separate templates for every non-market city would be overkill, but it is an option.
• I can understand that and could really go either way. Input from anyone else on this point is welcomed.
• I saw at least one template already putting city names on NOAA stations. The ones I was working on combining only had one station on each template, without a city name, and I didn't add city names when combining them. It's true that we're not hurting for space so adding them wouldn't exactly cause issues, but at the same time I feel like standards should be based on some kind of reasoning and I just wonder if there is any solid reason for/against doing it, other than "it seems helpful/nice".

I actually haven't tackled anything related to digital/HD radio yet, but here are my off-the-cuff thoughts:

Given that digital subchannels are under the control of the licensee of the base frequency and cannot exist without such a licensee, the only information in question for a given frequency is (1) do any digital subchannels exist at all, and (2) how many are there. They don't go by different call signs; the only difference is programming. So it seems to me that this info would be most at home on an individual station's page and I don't see a need for it in the template as it will only clutter things up.

Thanks for chiming in!
-Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 21:35, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Some notes from me...

• The reason call signs are used for frequencies with more than one station is because in some very large cities or with some LPFMs, including time-shared LPFMs, they are audible in parts of the same city. K241BQ and K241CS both reach parts of Phoenix and have transmitters in Phoenix. Listing the former as "Ft. McDowell" is a complete mismatch for its service area.
• I worry that in most cases HD subchannel listings would be clutter.
• There are some markets that are not rated but clearly share a set of stations that demand a navbox. One example is {{Nogales Radio}}, where I merged US and Mexican templates covering mostly the same area, and I'd like to keep it that way.

Sammi Brie (she/her • t • c) 07:24, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Firstly, putting your signature somewhere other than the end of your comment completely breaks the Reply button, which kinda sucks. In this case, it also makes it hard to tell where your comment ends and my reply begins. So in keeping with WP:SIG I've moved it to the end.

• Fair point on the call signs. Sounds to me like there's enough reasoning to make that a standard.
• Agreed about HD channels being clutter.
• Your point is exactly my point. I can totally see the value in a navbox for areas not officially designated as "markets" -- my thing is, I feel like we should have some standardized criteria to determine when a place deserves its own non-market navbox, and how much should be included / how big such an area should be. Or should it just be completely arbitrary?

— Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 20:28, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Not everything needs a navbox. Certainly fewer than five stations would be a non-starter. Sammi Brie (she/her • t • c) 21:10, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

I also want to add that a user who has done a significant amount of work on these in the past has written an essay in userspace that I think would be a great starting point for what I'm looking for: User:DrChuck68/Radio_station_regional_navbox

— Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 20:35, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

So a few comments.

Firstly, I do think Tyler and Longview should be separate, as the cities are 40 miles apart, and Longview (and Marshall even moreso) have a fair number of stations exclusively serving that area. I think radio navbox template definitions should be based on metro areas and/or official market definitions in many cases, but also taking shared coverage (or lack thereof) into account. Some examples:

There are several examples of two markets that are covered by two templates which overlap much more than Tyler and Longview do, and in most cases, have many stations from both markets transmitting from the same sites (often at high altitudes) with full market coverage of both cities, or in the case of the last 2 examples, at least two out of the three markets mentioned. Examples include

• Mobile, AL and Pensacola, FL
• Savannah, GA and Hilton Head, SC
• Idaho Falls and Pocatello
• Colorado Springs and Pueblo
• Bridgeport and either New Haven or Stamford-Norwalk, CT (there is even a station in the Stamford template that transmits from downtown Bridgeport yet isn’t in the Bridgeport template)
• Finally, Harrisburg, Lancaster and York, PA

There are also examples of official markets being split into multiple navboxes (like Tyler and Longview are) for a number of reasons. Examples and justifications include:

• Santa Rosa and San Francisco are separate, as Santa Rosa has a full radio dial separate from SF’s and due to being 50+ miles from SF, many SF stations don’t cover much of the SR area clearly.
• Template:Nantucket Radio is separate from Template:Cape Cod Radio. While Nantucket is not part of the Cape Cod market, it is heavily tied to the Cape Cod area culturally and can receive many Cape stations, plus the Nantucket template contains a measly 4 stations, which is (in my opinion) not enough to justify a separate navbox
• Stroudsburg is separate from Scranton as Stroudsburg is separated from the remainder of the market by the Pocono Mountains and thus can’t receive most Scranton stations clearly
• North Conway is around 65 miles away from Concord, NH and, like with Stroudsburg, is also near a major mountain range that impacts reception of in-market stations. On the other hand, Concord is only 18 miles from Manchester, and many stations from Manchester come in slightly clearer in Concord than those in the Lakes Region.
• Newport is separate from Providence. While all Providence stations come in clearly in Newport, Newport also has around a dozen stations of its own that usually don’t cover Providence very well (making it a sort of unofficial embedded market)
• Finally, Lewiston-Auburn is separate from Portland, ME. These templates/areas do overlap quite a bit, but there are still enough stations from both templates that don’t clearly reach both cities that two separate templates are still justified. TomG2002 (talk) 13:25, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for adding your thoughts. So if I understand correctly, your ideal would be to go by official markets except in cases where they don't make sense based on coverage, such as two adjacent markets with a ton of overlap, or one market with a lot of non-overlapping signals. Is that about right?

I can definitely see how that makes sense for overlapping markets, but in the latter case like Tyler-Longview, I feel like we need to come up with a more solid way of defining the exact area our templates cover. I.e. is it just the MSA boundary? Or do we go by county lines? How do we decide what is sufficient separation for splitting a market up? Could there be standard rules or would it be determined on a market-by-market basis?

And furthermore, should Tyler stations that have decent coverage of Longview be included in the Longview template?

Also, from what you're saying, it sounds like the Nantucket and Cape Cod templates should be merged, since what you provided was kind of the opposite of the "justifications" you mentioned.

  — Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 14:34, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I think that stations with strong coverage of two metros should be on both templates. This has been an issue on some templates (particularly in the northeast, where markets are closer together), but I think that if a station actively targets more than one market and/or has a strong signal over both areas should be in both. In Tyler/Longview’s case, this would include 93.1 from Tyler and the two Longview stations on both templates (and possibly some others, I’m not too familiar with Texas’ markets). Other examples more local to me would include WOKQ (a Portsmouth market station that also targets Manchester and is #3 in their ratings), WCTK (a New Bedford, MA station that has its studio in Providence and is already in both templates) and WPST (a Trenton, NJ station that has its transmitter in the Philly market, covers the entire city of Philly, and has a promotions presence). More gray area instances would be something like many of the Hartford, CT and Springfield, MA, where the two markets have more overlap than most, and stations in both cities can be heard in their principle cities clearly, but not beyond that (ie: most Springfield stations don’t reach Hartford’s southern suburbs, and most Hartford stations don’t reach places like Northampton, MA). For this reason, and because they are considered separate by most station owners, I’d keep those markets separate except in a few cases (WMAS serves Springfield but is licensed to a Hartford-market town, for instance). This is different from the Harrisburg/Lancaster/York example, where many companies sell their stations regionwide or at least to 2 out of the 3 markets, or the Mobile/Pensacola example which is even more extreme (the majority of stations in both markets transmit from the same antenna farm on very tall towers which give them full market coverage, making the Mobile/Pensacola market distinction practically meaningless).

As for market definitions/what stations are on what templates, I’ve usually gone off a combination of metro area/MSA definitions, common coverage and what market the station considers themselves to be in. For instance, WXLO-FM has a Worcester, MA studio and is considered a Worcester market station, but also has a strong promotions presence and signal in Boston’s western/northern suburbs (to the point where it includes Boston in its legal ID and has boosters in the downtown area), so it is also in that market’s template. The station also covers Manchester NH, but as it hardly has any advertising up there, it isn’t on the Manch template. WMVX is technically considered by Nielsen to be a Portsmouth NH-market station, but that’s only because Nielsen’s definition of the market is drawn on county lines — in reality, the station’s marketing and signal favor the Merrimack Valley (whose largest city is Manchester, and hence is in the Manchester template). Legal IDs can also be a good determiner of this — if a station includes multiple markets in their legal ID, then they should probably be in multiple templates.TomG2002 (talk) 16:11, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

So today I've been going over some stuff in Template:DFW Radio and found a few interesting cases I wasn't sure about.

For instance: this template includes 1340 AM (KAND), which is based out of Corsicana. I personally wouldn't consider Corsicana part of the DFW metro, but their 0.5 mV/m daytime signal does cover Dallas -- and their 2.0 mV/m contour (plus marketing) covers Ennis and Waxahachie, which I would definitely include in the metro. So should it be included in this template based on weaker signal coverage reaching Dallas, or stronger coverage reaching Ennis/Waxahachie, or based on the marketing including Ennis/Waxahachie? Or should it be excluded since it's from Corsicana which I would consider as outside the metro?

A few other stations I would question on a similar basis:

• KVTT - Mineral Wells may or may not be considered as part of the metro, but the signal definitely covers the metro.
• KGAF - Gainesville is not within the official DFW market, but would one consider it part of the metro? I personally wouldn't, however I might include adjacent Grayson county (Van Alstyne / Sherman) in the metro, so... I dunno. The signal only kinda-sorta covers the metro.

— Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 17:12, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

I would group all of those with DFW, as there is no separate template for any of those adjacent areas (aside from Sherman/Denison). I’ve noticed that in a lot of cases where there are rural areas surrounding a metro area/MSA, those outlying stations are included on the template despite not covering/targeting the market. In some cases, like the templates for Jackson, TN, Kansas City or Wichita, these rural areas extend well outside the market boundaries, but like with the examples provided above in the DFW area, there may not be enough stations to justify a separate template for these stations. I would suggest possibly creating an “outlying areas” section on those templates to differentiate in-market stations that target the “home market” of the template from stations that cover other areas or are not in the market but are still on the template (this is something that some US templates are already doing, as well as most Canadian ones). There are other templates that could use this distinction as well. An especially extreme example would be Template:Northern and Downeast Maine Radio where there are two very distinct camps of stations (stations serving Presque Isle/Aroostook County and stations serving the coastal areas 100+ miles to the south), where two separate templates are justified. TomG2002 (talk) 19:10, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

The "outlying areas" idea isn't a bad one. However, your reply brings up another question in my mind: is it ideal or appropriate that all radio stations be included in at least one navbox? It sounds like that is what you think. (Or put another way, does an outlying station that doesn't really cover the nearest metro need to be included in the navbox for said metro as opposed to being in none at all?)

See also: User:DrChuck68/Radio_station_regional_navbox#Radio_station_placement

My opinion would be, if an outlying station's signal still covers a decent amount of the metro, it might be worth including, but otherwise not. For example, this would lead me to include KVTT in the DFW box, but not so sure about the other two. If this were to be the standard we'd go by, then we would have to decide how much coverage is enough. For example, we'd have to ask, is it enough that KAND covers Dallas in its 0.5 mV/m contour, or is that too weak of a signal to count?

  — Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 19:59, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Editwarring over format

There's been an edit war at WHBQ-FM over whether the station's format should be more properly described as "hot adult contemporary" or "contemporary hit radio", which has gone on for long enough (and also became a redlinked-category problem because one of the edit-warrers somehow had the very, very wrong idea that the category for CHR stations would be at "Top 40" instead of "contemporary hit radio". And for added bonus, until this started the station was categorized as classic hits.

I've had to editprotect the page for one week to shut down the editwar and force it to a talk page discussion. Since I'm a Canadian public radio geek with very little current knowledge of US commercial radio these days, could somebody with more knowledge weigh in at Talk:WHBQ-FM? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 16:41, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm in the US, but I don't think whatever knowledge I have of US commercial radio informs me any better than you on this issue. I don't know how this could be settled without someone doing some OR. I did a tiny bit of Googling on the difference between the two and found that it is a rather fine line. — Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 04:49, 16 May 2023 (UTC)