I recall there was a proposal for Sbs radio to go into Launceston years ago but I don’t think it ever got off the ground. I think there was a frequency allocated but they never went to air.
1 Like
SCA will launch Easy Hits and Triple M Classic Rock Digital alongside hit100.9 and Triple M Hobart from April 1
3 Likes
I think it was supposed to be on 104.5
ABC Radio Hobart weekend presenter, Chris Wisbey, has announced his retirement after 38 years with the broadcaster. His last day will be Sunday 7th April with a special farewell broadcast to air at 10am-12pm.
More: https://radioinfo.com.au/news/chris-wisbey-announces-his-retirement-abc-radio-hobart
3 Likes
Brian Carlton at Harvey Norman.
1 Like
On this day in 1937 7HT was officially opened by Premier A G Ogilvie.
The company that held the license was Metropolitan Broadcasters Pty Ltd. The original members of the board were B. A McCann (Chairman), Colonel Spencer (Secretary and Treasurer), Len McCann, Robert Morris, and F. Peacock.
The original manager of 7HT was Richard C. Thomas, from the ABC and was known as “Taffy.”
The original announcers were: R C. Thomas (Children’s Session and general), Ron Phyle (General and Studio Manager), Neta Chaston (Women’s Session and general), Jim Cross (“Early Bird” on the Breakfast Session), and Bill Barwick (Sporting Editor).
Copy was Neta Chaston, Schedules and Office was Elaine Ogilvie, Sales was Jim Cross and Bill Barwick, and Technical was Gil Miles (Chief Engineer), and Norm Stone (Technician).
Pat Stephenson joined two weeks later as the Record Librarian and woman announcer and within six months there came Ritch Vertigan, Jack Spencer, Jack Vertigan, and Wally Elliott.
The original transmission site was at Rosny Hill with the power of 500 watts. 7HT’s original studio was situated at 71 Murrary Street, which today is near the entrance to the Cat and Fiddle Arcade.
From the Mercury
2 Likes
7XS Studios in Queenstown today. Sounds as though they are local all day? Even yesterday it sounded local. Or voicetracked.
Drove from Queenstown to Launceston today and found 7XS was definitely unique compared to BU/AD and LA/SD.
4 Likes
7XS shares 7HO’s log for most of the day (cutting to the Northern Tasmanian AC log for Tasmanian Talks at midday). Mostly voicetracked from Hobart, I think. They do an awesome job for such a small area.
4 Likes
Seemed to skew a bit older than HO from my 2 days of listening but won’t argue as you live here and I don’t 
For a one station market I think they do well. Good mix of music (I’m not a fan of new music and the newer music they played wasn’t too bad), and had a local feel about it. Very small market so surprised it sounded the way it did.
I think they need to pump a few more watts into the transmitters but that’s for another argument 
4 Likes
It’s amazing to think that 7XS, as the only commercial radio station on the West Coast of Tasmania, plays a better variety of old & new music than its sister station in a 2-station market of Wollongong (Wave FM), which mostly play the same music as its only other commercial rival (i98).
Here are the links via Lava (log-in required):
7XS
Wave FM
i98
And yes, I know talking about Wollongong radio is out of place for the “Tasmanian Radio” thread, but it’s worth pointing it out on how there’s better music variety on just one station than across two stations that compete with each other. 
2 Likes
One thing I found about 7XS was they were very local and the locals seemed to appreciate that. Things like they had the GM from the Council on every week and would have a chat and talkback with him, that was a few GM’s ago but I think it continued with the other ones and also others around the community, when I was doing work for the Pharmacy they were often on too.
I did more listening to AD and BU though over the last couple of months with the change to FM and after being an ABC Radio listener for years because that seemed to be more local and I was sick of all the ads, I’ve been pleasantly surprised to hear so much local content from them, even different content at times between BU and AD which growing up had always been the same with the LA, SD, BU and AD Bass Radio network.
4 Likes
Yeah, The Grant network get it. Localism is key in the world of streaming services.
2 Likes
As it happens, Grant own almost every commercial radio stations in Tasmania, bar the 2 in Hobart which are owned by SCA (Triple M & Hit).
In fact, around over a decade ago, Macquarie Regional Radioworks (MRR) owned nearly every commercial radio stations in Tasmania, with HO in Hobart the only odd one out (7XS was another odd one out before MRR bought it in 2006). It’s amazing on how the tide has turned since then.
3 Likes
Every shop I walked into, 7XS was on the radio. And yes they still talk to the Mayor - on Friday mornings it seems. Sounds like 7AD and 7BU have adopted this as well. No idea about LA and SD.
My listening today seems to indicate that 7BU/AD share resources, shows and logs and SD/LA share. So much that the announcer this afternoon kept mentioning “You’re listening to LAFM 7SD”
3 Likes
Is there a reason that Tasmania Talks is not broadcast on 7HO i don’t think Hobart people would mind that it is broadcast from the north of the state.
I travel to the west coast for work regularly, and the locals do seem to have a real connection to 7XS. I guess its the local factor. ABC Local radio is either interstate, Lonny or Hobart content. Along way away from the wilds of the west coast…
They still have the WCC GM on regularly, plus local advertisers.
on a side note on the remoteness of the west coast, I remember years ago, a quirk of the then non-aggregated TV market was that Queenstown / West Coast couldn’t watch the cricket out of Hobart live, because they were served by TVT6, the local television station in Hobart, who weren’t allowed to show the cricket live against the gate. Queenstown is a fair hook, to go to the cricket for the day…Did anyone at the ACB own a map??
Don’t get to hear 7AD and BU regularly, but both now run local breakfast shows, then shared Northern Tas content out of Launceston. Arvo and Drive are shared across 7BU and AD with a local drive show, I suspect based out of Devonport.
There is no real difference between LAFM and 7SD, except different ads. Sad really that 7SD has been reduced to basically a repeater of LAFM.
I would however congratulate Grant’s on keeping these stations essentially local. I remember when RG Capital owned the lot and the vast majority of content was either piped out of Launceston, or the Albury or Goldie hubs…Well done Grants.
6 Likes
Yes, this was always weird as for everything else the West Coast is lumped in with the North-West - e.g. they’re part of the Braddon electorate, when people talk about going to the city they usually mean Burnie, the closest hospital is Burnie etc… but for some reason the TV was Hobart and TVT6/TasTV South, same with a fair way up the East Coast I believe.
1 Like
Yeah I think it was only Queenstown and Strahan were part of TVT6 territory, yet Mt Reid was TNT9.
I suspect it had more to do with the cheapest solution to get feeds to TX’s than a ‘that our territory’ from the sales staff.
Experience tells me that Mt Wellington booms into Mt Owen, and as a result I suspect the Mt Owen TX was and potentially still is fed ‘off air’ from Welly. I suspect Mt Reid was probably originally fed ‘off air’ off either Hampshire (the site name escapes me) or Table Cape or Round Hill.
I think on the East Coast TVT6 territory ended at Orford. I think everything North was TNT Territory.
I suspect if you ran the ruler over the sites TNT owned/operated vs TVT, it would be 2 to 1…
Maybe from memory the Mt Owen Boomgate had a Southern Tas Telstra/Telecom key on it, so maybe it was also a left over from the old PMG/Telecom days also.
But I digress for the ‘radio’ theme of this thread…
3 Likes
Apparently Bicheno had a TVT6 relay.
And yes, I always felt sorry for the people on the west coast of Tassie whenever I heard “it’s time to say goodbye to our Hobart viewers…” on the cricket.