Clear channel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- For the company, see Clear Channel Communications.
- The term is also used in the context of T1 [2] [3].
A clear channel, in the general sense, is a communications channel (such as a radio frequency) on which only one transmitter operates at a time. In North America, the term also refers to a regulatory category for mediumwave radio stations.
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[edit] Clear-channel stations
Certain mediumwave frequencies were set aside under the North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA for short) for nighttime use by only one or two specific AM stations, covering a wide area via sky wave propagation; these frequencies were known as the clear channels, and the stations on them are thus clear-channel stations. Where only one station was assigned to a clear channel, the treaty provides that it must operate with a nominal power of 50 kilowatts or more; stations on the other clear channels, with two or more stations, must use between 10 and 50 kW, and most often use a directional antenna so as not to interfere with each other. In addition to the frequencies, the treaty also specified the specific locations where stations on this second kind of channel (known as class I-B) could be built.
Some of the original NARBA signatories, including the United States, Canada, and Mexico, have implemented bilateral agreements that supersede its terms, eliminating among other things the distinction between the two kinds of clear channel: the original "I-A", "I-B", and "I-N" station classes are now all included in class A.
Clear-channel stations, unlike all other AM stations in North America, have a secondary service area—that is, they are entitled to protection from interference to their nighttime skywave signals. Other stations are entitled, at most, to protection from nighttime interference in their primary service area—that which is covered by their groundwave signal.
Many stations beyond those listed in the treaty have been assigned to operate on a clear channel (and some had been long before NARBA came into effect in 1941). In most cases, those stations operate during the daytime only, so as not to interfere with the primary stations on those channels. Since the early 1980s, many such stations have been permitted to operate at night with such low power as to be deemed not to interfere; these stations are still considered "daytimers" and are not entitled to any protection from interference to their nighttime signals. Another group of stations, formerly known as class II stations, were licensed to operate on the former "I-B" clear channels with significant power at night, provided that they use directional antenna systems to minimize radiation towards the primary stations.
Clear Channel Communications, a San Antonio, Texas-based company which owns over 1200 U.S. radio stations, was originally formed to purchase one clear-channel station, WOAI. The company now owns more than a dozen such stations.
[edit] History
For the U.S., clear channels first appeared in 1922 when the Commerce Department moved stations which had all used two frequencies (one for entertainment stations, one for news) onto 52 frequencies. Two were used for all low-power stations and the large stations each got their own frequency. A few frequencies were used on both the East and West Coast, which were considered far enough apart to limit interference. At this time large stations were limited to 1000 watts. Later in 1928, the AM band was reorganized with local, regional and clear channels (and a few reserved for Canada) by the new Federal Radio Commission's General Order 40. Gradually maximum power was increased to 50,000 watts (with some short lived experiments with 500,000 watt "super-power" operation). This system was continued in the 1941 NARBA system although almost all stations shifted broadcast frequencies.
As early as the 1950s, debate raged in Washington, D.C., and in the U.S. broadcasting industry over whether continuation of the clear-channel system was justifiable. The licensees of clear-channel stations argued that, without their special status, many rural areas would receive no radio service at all. They requested that the power limit on the "I-A" channels in the U.S. be increased from 50 kW to 750 kW, pointing to WLW's successful experiments before the war, and in later years successful implementation by state broadcasters in Europe and the Middle East, as evidence that this would work and improve the service received by most Americans. Other broadcasters, particularly in the western states, argued to the contrary—that if the special status of the clear-channel stations were eliminated, they would be able to build new stations to provide local service to those rural "dark areas".
One station, KOB in Albuquerque, New Mexico, fought a long legal battle against the FCC and New York's WABC for the right to move from a regional channel to a clear channel, 770 kHz, arguing that the New York signal was so weak in the mountain west that it served no one. KOB eventually won the argument in the late 1960s; it and several other western stations were allowed to move to eastern clear channels. (Western clear channels, like 680 in San Francisco, had been "duplicated" in the eastern states for many years.) These new class II-A assignments (in places like Window Rock, Arizona; Boise, Idaho; Las Vegas and Reno, Nevada; Lexington, Nebraska; Casper, Wyoming; Kalispell, Montana; and others) began what would later be called "the breakdown of the clear channels". The class I-A station owners' proposal to increase power fifteen-fold was not immediately quashed, but the new II-A stations would make it effectively impossible for stations on the duplicated channels to do so, and the owners eventually lost interest. That proposal was finally taken off the FCC's docket in the late 1970s.
In 1987 the FCC changed its rules to prohibit applications for new "class-D" stations. (Class-D stations have night power between zero and 250 watts, and frequently operate on clear channels.) However, any existing station could voluntarily relinquish nighttime authority, thereby becoming a class-D, and several have done so since the rule change.
[edit] List of all clear-channel stations
The following two tables show all of the class-A stations in North America. Stations in Alaska (the former class I-Ns) are shown separately.
- ^ WOWO was previously a class-A station and is called out in the treaties as such. However, in the 1990s WOWO was downgraded to a class B allotment by reducing its night power to 9.8 kW, and thus no longer has a secondary service area.
- ^ The 1580 kHz frequency was originally allocated to CBJ in Chicoutimi, Quebec. After that station moved to FM in 1999, CHUC applied for and was granted 1580 kHz in Cobourg, Ontario with 10 kW, but chose instead to move to FM itself (despite being notified to the U.S. as an existing station on 1580). CKDO moved from 1350 to 1580 kHz on August 13, 2006 and became that day a class A station using 10 kW. [1]
