According to the final 5 Year Spectrum Outlook 2019-23 released by ACMA today, consultations on digital radio channel plans for a number of regional radio licence areas are due to take place early next year (Q1 2020; January-March). The draft FYSO mentioned that consultations for Bathurst, Cooma, Goulburn & Warragul were due to take place this quarter (Q1 2019-20; July-September 2019), but it has seemed to have pushed back.
Interesting that they’ve put Newcastle & Campbelltown in allotment 3 & Wollongong & Gosford in allotment 4, that puts market areas even closer together than the Illawarra/Newcastle DTV & FM allotments.
TXA have issues with the tiny power DTV translator at Raymond Terrace interfering with our DTV translator service at Picton (behind Razorback) over the summer periods. Razorback & Mt Sugarloaf DAB+ will easily interfere with each other.
I also think they’ll need more transmission sites around Newcastle to get the coverage indicated on the maps, which still falls short of reliable coverage in quite a few areas as is.
Not to mention that Goulburn is being put in the same allotment as Wollongong. It’s as if 2GN’s allocation of 107.7 for its FM conversion wasn’t bad enough already.
It’s also worth noting that for a future DAB+ transmission, Brokers Nose would be used as the main transmitter site for Wollongong, whilst Cambewarra Mountain would be used as the main site for Nowra.
Both Wollongong & Nowra would have DAB+ translators at Saddleback Mountain to service Kiama, which would ensure that the people of Kiama & surrounds would finally have access to a local ‘classic hits’ station, courtesy of 2ST. However, at the same time, I could see Wave FM launch a digital-only 2WL station with a ‘classic hits’ format.
Surprised it hasn’t been mentioned on here, but after 10 years, late last week Koffee was replaced with Smooth Relax.
Not a rebranding like the other recent plethora of unnecessary rebrands, but a complete repositioning from something unique and interesting, to more of the same of Smooth to the point where it’s hard to work out what the difference is.
Suffice to say the station that used to be the first present on the car radio has now been deleted!
The Dab+ Coverage maps for Wollongong, Goulburn, Lithgow, Katoomba, Nowra, and Gosford are interesting viewing.
Looking at the Wollongong coverage map I can see significant co-channel interference between Gosford and Wollongong during big coastal tropo openings in summer. Most likely Wollongong interfering with Gosford considering how much signal goes out to sea to the north east of Brokers Nose. Brokers Nose community fm stations are received at my location with my setup, so Gosford and Wollongong on the same frequency will be troublesome.
Hasn’t ACMA learnt their lesson over the years from Cochanneling Newcastle and Wollongong??
The Helensburgh infill is actually Stanwell Tops, and as the tower is very small and terrain shielded to the north it will only cover Stanwell Park and Coal Cliff. It will not cover Helensburgh.
Gosford dab+ looks to have very little overspill into Sydney. Coverage only looks possible around Palm Beach and Berowra, very similar coverage towards Sydney as the Gosford town nationals. Looks like no chance of receiving it at Stanhope Gardens.
Nowra Dab+
Because Saddleback Mountain will be used over Knights Hill, there will be a poor to no dab+ reception in the town of Robertson.
Knights Hill would be a better option then Saddleback. With a very low ERP of 0.5KW you can cover Kiama and Robertson. The coverage would then merge with the Gib.
I still cannot see the point of seperate LA’s for Wollongong and Nowra. Wave fm will put Power fm and possibly 2ST on the Wollongong Mux. Just do them all from Knights Hill at 5KW with the other sites as low powered infills.
Looks like Campbelltown, Lithgow, and Katoomba will be my only chances for dxing.
The Dab+ signal from these will get into Western Sydney to some extent thanks to no restrictions to the east from Wentworth falls. It will be low powered at 500w max. This will kill off any extreme Canberra 8d dxing and most likely from the Gib too.
Goulburn
Dxing should be possible from the Gib at 5KW erp from Mt Gray, but with Wollongong on the same frequency will prevent dxing opportunities from Sydney.
Which would leave someone like me with nothing but maybe Sydney reception during summer, with Wollongong canceling out Gosford, and Campbelltown canceling out my local Newcastle signals.
Or if Canberra is strong enough, maybe nothing at all
Essentially the decision seems to be that they only care about covering population areas - the default position is to have a bunch of low powered transmitters scattered across the license area, leaving huge sections of the market not covered.
In many areas, there’s almost none of the road network covered, with little dots around towns, often barely covering the population centres.
One example, just as it’s an area I’m more familiar with than some of the more baffling examples in Queensland - Anglesea and Lorne would double up between Colac and Geelong transmitters - but Winchelsea and Teesdale would only be serviced by Colac, despite being well within the Geelong license area.
Huge amounts of the region, that get perfectly fine signals on FM - like Lethbridge and Meredith, would get poor to no signal - and that assumes they’d put the investment in establishing the amount of transmitter sites needed to just barely cover a portion of their license area.
Attaching a few examples of some other other maps that show off how limited this coverage looks to be - all cases where it would be very logical to just have higher power services, but the need to pack everything in so tight would in a lot of cases prevent it.
The Coffs Harbour DAB+ coverage maps are interesting. I note that the Mount Moombil transmitter will only be 1kw ERP and the 2HC site at Raleigh will have a DAB+ transmitter as well. Looks like most of the populated areas will have coverage. If Mount Moombil will only have 1kw, I don’t even know why they are bothering with it.
You might be lucky having a translator just up the road at the Highfields DTV site, your received levels in power & C/N might just be high enough for Campbelltown not to have any effect, but then knowing what I know, you’re probably spot on with your assessment?
It’s not a high resolution map, but if you zoom in there’s a lot of places around Newcastle (especially between you & me) who have according to the map, very little protection C/N & power level between signal work & signal failure.
At least the coverage areas for Toowoomba and Townsville include the major centres outside the city like Dalby, Warwick, Ayr and Bowen. I thought they might have initially missed out.
From the Wollongong maps, it looks like pretty much as soon as you hop on the M1 (F6) north of Wollongong, there’s no reception coverage from Wollongong DAB+. What’s ironic is that the Sydney DAB+ transmissions cover the M1 better than the Wollongong transmission will – i.e. out-of-market signals will have better coverage than the in-market signals.
Listening to Whitney Houston screaming her t_ts off on the 2nd song I listened to was enough to turn me off. Not my idea of relaxing having her on a playlist sorry. Hopefully Michael Bolton isn’t there as well.
Wonder how often the some old songs get repeated knowing the playlist of Smooth FM?
I’ve heard today, that construction has started on the Como (Sydney) DAB+ translator site, apparently it’s a difficult build & will take some time, also why it hasn’t been done before now.
The digital radio joint ventures annual report published on the ACCC website yesterday also mentions that a Mornington Peninsula repeater is back on the agenda.
Where in Como will be the site?? It’s of interest as I use to live across the river at Oatley.
Wouldn’t it have been easier to use the Penshurst water tower 2NBC pole to mount the dab+ array with a directional antenna to the south. Cover Oatley, Como, and Hurstville grove. Where dab+ can be difficult in places.
Not sure exactly, I heard the top of the hill near or at a mobile phone tower, & they have to get the electricity across about 150m of Crown land to the site, so I’m thinking possibly the mobile phone tower between Tudar Rd & the Woronora river near the bridge?
