FM broadcasting in the UK
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FM broadcasting began in the United Kingdom on May 2, 1955 when the BBC started an FM service broadcasting the Light Programme, the Third Programme and the Home Service to the south east of England.[1] There are now over 40 BBC and over 250 commercial FM stations broadcasting in the UK.[2]
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[edit] BBC
The BBC began using FM radio in 1955, but at that time AM broadcasting predominated. The BBC's main station Radio 1 left mediumwave only in 1994, but had been using FM full-time for six years previously, part-time before 1988. All of the BBC's analogue services, including Radios 1, 2, 3, and 4 and BBC Local Radio are provided on FM, although Radio 4 uses mediumwave in some areas, longwave for international broadcasting; Local Radio broadcasts opt-outs on medium wave. The only analogue service not to use FM is Radio Five Live.
[edit] Commercial broadcasting
Legal commercial broadcasting began in the UK in 1973, with the launch of LBC, though illegal pirate radio stations operated in the 1960s, usually from ships anchored off the coast of Britain, until the Marine Offences Act of 1967 made their continued operation impractical.
Early licenses were granted to wide-area stations, such as Capital Radio which served London and the home counties. Later more local stations were introduced. There is also one national commercial radio station, Classic FM.
From the very beginning, commercial broadcasting has had a base on FM, but the frequencies in use now were previously unavailable because of the allocation for police radio, which has converted to digital. For example, Marcher Sound 103.4 was on 95.4 MHz until 1988, when a frequency review allowed for the frequency change. The FM service was always simulcasted with mediumwave, until 1989–1990, when the IBA asked radio stations to end simulcasting, so another service (typically a Gold format) went to AM, and the regular service continued on FM. It was before this, FM became the preferred method of listening.
[edit] Frequency allocation
The UK and New Zealand until recently shared an FM broadcasting allocation of 88.0–105.0 MHz. This allocation can be traced to the 405 line system's VHF allocation.
- NZ considered adopting the 405 line system, but adopted PAL instead – but the frequency allocation issue was not fixed until the late 1990s.
- because the UK's allocation for 405 line TV was set up before the FM allocation, this resulted in the UK allocation possessing 2 MHz less spectrum.
Both New Zealand and the UK have the standard global allocation of 88.0–108.0 MHz for FM now.
[edit] Subcarriers
The UK permits Radio Data System (RDS) subcarriers.
