I think the existing commercial operators would make sure that never happens. See what happened in Perth.
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I’m not really sure they could do anything about it if the government really wanted to introduce new commercial FM licences (mind you, I don’t think there’s any will to do that at the moment). The existing operators couldn’t stop the last round of new licences in the early 2000’s. But yes, the Perth situation was a complete joke and showed the lack of power from the so-called “regulator” ACMA.
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That’s true. They’re all about protecting the oligopoly that exists in Australian media.
This is a good example of why it appears the ABC has little to no desire to roll out DAB regionally.
Yes, a real head scratcher. Unless NE Tasmania had a local MP championing the cause, I really don’t understand why the ABC chose Launceston, as opposed to say Toowoomba.
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On the positive side, an oligopoly is better than a duopoly or a monopoly. And unlike America or NZ, Australia at least has 2 well-funded and relevant national broadcasters, as well as the best community radio industry in the world.
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It was just set up as an experiment into low powered/local DAB broadcasting, like they have in the UK. The office is in the middle of town. Maybe that helped make the decision. But unlike the UK where these local DAB muxes are being licensed more and more, nothing has come of it here.
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I’ll bring this over here to avoid getting too much in the weeds, but Bunnings Tradio replaced RSN Xtra 2 in Melbourne
| Station | Bits | EEP | CU |
|---|---|---|---|
| RSN Racing&Sport | 40kbps | EEP 3-A | 30 |
| RSN Xtra 1 | 32kbps | EEP 3-A | 24 |
| Bunnings Tradio | 32kbps | EEP 3-A | 24 |
| RSN Xtra 3 | 32kbps | EEP 3-A | 24 |
| SEN 1116 | 32kbps | EEP 3-A | 24 |
| SEN Fanatic | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| SENTrack | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| Vision Christian | 64kbps | EEP 3-B | 36 |
So SEN’s using their 96CU - but RSN is inexplicably using less. They bought 32kbps at the capacity auction (so 24 CU in practice) but only use 104CU of it. One of SEN’s first changes after they took RSN ownership was dropping RSN from 64kbps down to 40kbps, and replacing TAB Lounge at 24kbps with RSN Xtra 3.
Could easily bump Bunnings up to 64kbps, I’d do something like this to maximise their bits.
| Station | Bits | EEP | CU |
|---|---|---|---|
| RSN Racing&Sport | 40kbps | EEP 3-A | 30 |
| RSN Xtra 1 | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| RSN Xtra 2 | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| SEN Sydney | 24kbps | EEP 4-A | 12 |
| Bunnings Tradio | 64kbps | EEP 3-B | 36 |
| SEN 1116 | 40kbps | EEP 3-A | 30 |
| SEN Fanatic | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| SENTrack | 32kbps | EEP 3-B | 18 |
| Vision Christian | 64kbps | EEP 3-B | 36 |
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I’ve also noticed signal issues here in Melbourne on 9C.. don’t think it’s related to the LoRA repeater I installed a few days back though it would be good if they at least let people take out self help licenses..
I wonder if Geelong will be the next regional area to transition to DAB after Bay 93.9 and K-Rock 95.5 completed a significant upgrade of their transmission facilities at Murradoc Hill last year.
Australia Broadcasters Unite for Nautel Transmitter Upgrade - Nautel Broadcast.
Have Grant Broadcasters obtained a digital license for Geelong?
It will be interesting to see if Bay & K-Rock start digital test broadcasts this year.
No
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It will be good to see them get DAB transmissions up and running in Geelong at some point.
Grants did a good job with organising and rolling out the initial Gold Coast DAB transmissions.
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Won’t happen. Regional stations aren’t interested in DAB.
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It’s looking that way but with the tech upgrades, Grant’s would now have the capability to run DAB+ broadcasts alongside their FM signal, if they wanted to.
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They wouldn’t. All they did was replace the old NEC FM transmitters with new Nautel FM transmitters. Sorry but that has nothing to do with DAB+. About the only extra thing the new transmitters do is possibly HD radio on FM if that option is installed. And Australia doesn’t do HD radio.
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One small incentive that Geelong has to get on DAB is to help counter the Melbourne DAB+ overspill, which they’ve long complained about. And that their licence area also extends to Melbourne’s west, so their stations might be more readily noticed there when any DAB+ listeners do scans/auto scans for their local Melbourne stations.
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The likelihood of the Coalition regaining government federally is far greater than DAB+ being rolled out into regional areas.
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I’ve bookmarked this post. Keen to revisit it at the next federal election or when/if a regional area gets DAB+. 
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Yes, regional radio is a nice-to-have but not a priority for CRA, judging from previous comments made by the new CRA CEO. However, as they did a great job with the Gold Coast roll out, Geelong might have been an option for them too, but the likelihood is low, for now.
CRA provided at launch and for years on their dab site a schematic on how to commission an in store/in building repeater.
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