CKRG-FM
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CKRG is a Canadian radio station, which broadcasts at 89.9 FM in Toronto. It is the campus radio station of the city's Glendon College, a campus of York University.
A low-power station licensed to broadcast primarily to Glendon's campus.
CKRG offers a variety of programs in both English and French, and the programming schedule features both independent and mainstream music. CKRG is unique in this aspect, as the station's sole commitment is to bring good music to the ears of its listeners, and is not governed by an 'Indie Only' or genre-specific guideline.
[edit] History
CKRG began broadcasting in the early 1970's to the campus and surrounding area. In 1988, it lost its FM licence due to an unfortunate incident involving some CKRG staff who had access to the station transmitter. The proximity to the Glendon campus pub resulted in an attempt one evening to boost the station's transmitting power, which interfered with a much larger Toronto radio station, CILQ-FM (aka Q-107). Within hours the signal had been located and broadcasting was immediately shutdown. The station was reduced to broadcasting via wires to the campus cafeteria.
In 1991, station manager Derek Allerton began to rebuild the station and put forth a serious effort to re-acquire an FM licence to replace the temporary AM carrier-current licence (the signal was transmitted through the campus electrical system, rather than through the air) the station ran on. By 1993 the Toronto radio market had become saturated, and competition for the remaining broadcast frequencies was fierce. The CRTC denied the application. Fortunately, Allerton was able to use the FM application to justify funding increases, and update much of the station's broadcast equipment. Under his leadership, Allerton was able to attract many student volunteers who would invigorate the station and its listeners, including James Angleton, Marcos Benevides, Ed Beres, Adam Clark, Stephen Fulton, Chris Hazard, Stephan Paape, and Tom Scott.
After Allerton's exit as manager, and throughout much of the 1990s, the station focused on broadcasting to its core audience, the students of Glendon College. One notable exception was Edward Beres, who as manager was able to expand the station's facilities to include a dedicated broadcast booth beside the student pub. This allowed much more interaction with the student body beyond simply phone-in shows.
Due to the denial of the FM application, he also elected to add a second AM transmitter (on the same frequency), and moved one transmitter to each residence building. These fed the signal to the electrical system from there, rather than a single transmitter at a central location, thereby greatly reducing the distance between the transmitter and the listener. This significantly improved the signal quality in both residences, and resulted in a sharp increase in active listeners.
During Ed Beres' term years as manager he managed to recruit some very dedicated volunteers to carry on the station's day to day functions. New students would be attracted to the radio station, and its new and improved broadcast range into the residence buildings, cafeteria, and pub. Volunteers such as Mike Shering, Mike Glustein, David Taillefer, Richie Favalero, and Philip Godin took on the responsibilities of such tasks as the financial needs of the station, programming, music tracking, and recruiting of new student's as on-air DJ's. Ed updated the broadcast equipment, and made the station more accessible for student clubs to use for special event planning. He was also instrumental in knocking a hole in historic Glendon Manor's basement Pub.
There were several notable incidents during Beres' tenure as manager. The most critical was the theft of station broadcast equipment by persons unknown, which resulted in the immediate halt of plans for another FM license, and the funds for that project redirected to purchasing replacement equipment. A second incident involved the shooting of an "goth" adult film by several student DJ's during a late-night broadcast. They were discovered by campus security and the production was promptly shutdown. Those student DJ's were dismissed soon after.
Ed's successor as manager in 1995, Philip Godin, continued to create an accessible student radio station by promoting throughout the campus, hosting events for the new students during orientation week, and ensuring there was a regular broadcast schedule from 8 AM to 12AM. Godin wanted to improve the infrastructure of the radio station from the ground up, to prove to the CRTC that CKRG could be capable of broadcasting on the FM frequency once again. Thus regular station office hours were created, and all station volunteers were required to spend a few hours in the office during the week. Phil also continued to improve the station's functioning by creating a music database for new D.J.'s to be able to find and retrieve records and CDs for use in their radio shows. As well as ensuring a solid broadcast schedule for students at Glendon, Godin also started a co-op training program at CKRG which allowed local high schools in the area to teach students the basics in radio broadcasting. With the continued help and dedication of all sation volunteers, like Dave Taillefer, Graham Fader, Colin Lewis, Kaelin Britton, Chris Chang, and Martin Byrne, CKRG became an integral part of student life at Glendon College.
In 1998, the new station manager, Brad Crowe, took a decisive step in building up the radio station's listenership, and purchased a 1 watt transmitter which was capable of broadcasting to the campus, and did not require to be licensed by the CRTC due to its very small and limited range. Once again, CKRG was back on the air using the frequency 89.9 FM.
Beginning in 2002, live streaming of radio broadcasts allowed a much wider audience access to the station. Student DJ's were encouraged to incorporate new technology into their broadcasts. Previously it was common to see a DJ carrying a record crate or CD suitcase for their shows, but the sight of laptops became more common. Several up-and-coming dance music DJ's also graced the broadcast booth, including a then-unknown Toronto trance DJ named Joyrider, and Jonathan Swayze, a succesful electronica DJ.
A website and message forum was created. Unfortunately, the maintenance and bandwidth costs have caused the site to lapse from time to time.
[edit] Prominent past hosts
MC Poits
