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'REGIONAL' LOCAL RADIO LICENCE:
COVERAGE BRIEF
WEST MIDLANDS
1. This licence is being offered for the provision of an Independent Local Radio service on the FM (VHF) waveband. The licence is offered for the use, from a single transmission site, of a single frequency on this waveband. Applicants should prepare their coverage proposals on this basis.
2. The closing-date for applications for this licence is Tuesday, 22 August, 2000. Completed application forms must reach the Radio Authority, at Holbrook House, 14 Great Queen Street, London, WC2B 5DG, by 14.00 on that date. Applications delivered after this time will not normally be accepted. Twenty-five copies of the main application document should be provided (not twenty, as is usual), together with twenty copies of any financial or other confidential appendix.
3. This coverage brief provides information specific to the advertised licence for the West Midlands region. Intending applicants must study, in conjunction with this brief, the Notes of Guidance for Local Licence Applicants (January 2000 issue), available from the Authority's Director of Development, which provides general information on the submission of a licence application and the requirements of an ILR service. Applications must be submitted on a standard Application Form (Issue 24), also available from the Director of Development.
4. This licence is offered for a service designed to cover the following area:
The main conurbations of Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Walsall, and the surrounding areas, together with parts of Warwickshire and Staffordshire.
The Authority believes that adequate coverage, as defined in the Authority's guidance document, 'Coverage: Planning Policy, Definitions and Assessment', should include the main population centres of Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Walsall, Dudley, Sutton Coldfield and Solihull. Within Staffordshire, Cannock, Lichfield and Burton (but not Stafford) are expected to be served. Part of north Warwickshire should also be covered, although neither Coventry nor Nuneaton is likely to receive a signal of good quality.
5. The Authority anticipates that, if using the site and aerial characteristics detailed below, it is likely that this service would achieve coverage of an area with an adult (aged 15+) population of around 2,300,000 (although see also paragraph 12 below).
6. An FM frequency is being cleared for provisional use at an existing transmission site. Details of this site are as follows:
Location: Sutton Coldfield
National Grid reference: SK 113 003
Total maximum effective 11.0 kiloWatts (5.5. kW
radiated power: horizontal polarisation + 5.5 kW
vertical polarisation)
Aerial pattern: Directional (see attached template)
Aerial height: 328m above sea level
Frequency: 105.7 MHz
7. Whilst the clearance process is not yet completed, the Authority is aware that there will be a requirement, from this site, to achieve higher suppression levels of spurious emissions in the aeronautical bands than those required in Section 2.3 of the Local Analogue Licence Engineering Code. The size of these additional levels are still under discussion but may be as high as those shown below, and will need to be achieved at the outputs of all of the transmitters involved:
20dB at 110.1 MHz involving 88.3 MHz, 92.7 MHz, 105.7MHz
9 dB at 113.55 MHz involving 97.9 MHz, 105.7 MHz
2 dB at 113.75 MHz involving 92.7 MHz, 100.7 MHz, 105.7 MHz
8. The attached template is designed to restrict the coverage of the service to the area outlined in paragraph 4 above, as well as protecting the following ILR services: ILR Leicester on 105.4 MHz; the Cambridge transmitter of the East of England regional service on 105.6 MHz; the Humberside transmitter of the Yorkshire regional service on 105.8 MHz; the London ILR service on 105.8 MHz; and the East Midlands regional service on 106.0 MHz. The in-use transmission parameters for all of these services are available from the Radio Authority website.
9. The Sutton Coldfield site is operated by Crown Castle International, and is currently used for television, and national and local radio transmission. Use of this site would be subject to agreement with the site operator. Applicants must note that, although clearing a frequency with the DTI Radiocommunications Agency for use at this site, the Radio Authority has not ascertained whether there are any practical constraints or cost implications in using this site or in implementing the aerial characteristics noted above. It will be for applicants themselves, if they wish to propose use of the Sutton Coldfield site, to discuss these aspects with the site operator.
10. It is for applicants to decide whether to make use of the site described above, or to propose an alternative site of their own choosing, without prejudice to their application. Applicants who wish to propose an alternative site must note carefully the points outlined in paragraphs 3.5-3.6 of the 'Notes of Guidance for Local Licence Applicants', and in addition should recognise that the submission of an alternative proposal for approval and clearance is a process that may take several months to complete, and that an outcome that is wholly satisfactory to the successful applicant cannot be guaranteed. A more comprehensive account is provided in the 'Notes on Approval Procedures for Sites and Frequencies', one of the supplementary documents listed in the Foreword to the 'Notes of Guidance', available from the Authority. Applicants are strongly advised to obtain and study this.
11. The licensee will be responsible for its own transmission facilities, and will be free to decide whom to appoint for the supply, construction and maintenance of its transmission system and equipment. This will be the case whether the successful applicant chooses to locate the transmitter at Sutton Coldfield or at an alternative site.
Total Survey Area
12. Applicants should note that it is usual for a local radio licensee to claim a Total Survey Area (TSA), for marketing and audience research purposes, which is more extensive than the coverage area, as technically defined (see paragraphs 4-5 above), for which a licence is advertised. This reflects the fact that some listeners living beyond the 'measured coverage area' will receive a signal of listenable quality. The existing licensee for the West Midlands region, 100.7 Heart FM, has chosen to claim a TSA with an adult population of 3,409,000. Applicants are free to decide what TSA adult population figure to use as the basis of their business plan; however, the assumptions which are made should be justified in the application, in responding to the question on advertising revenue forecasts.
Programming proposals
13. In evaluating applications for this licence, the Authority will wish to assess the extent to which each applicant offers to provide a programme service which would broaden the range of audience choice in relation to ILR services available within the region; i.e. the existing West Midlands regional FM service, 100.7 Heart FM; the local services for Birmingham: 96.4 FM BRMB, Capital Gold 1152, Galaxy 102.2 and Radio XL 1296 AM; the local services for Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury & Telford: Beacon FM and Classic Gold WABC; the small-scale service for Wolverhampton, 107.7 The Wolf; and the station for South-East Staffordshire, Centre FM.
14. An existing licensee within this region may apply for this licence, as permitted by the revised ownership limits contained in the Broadcasting Act 1996 (Schedule 2), subject to the statutory provisions regarding plurality and diversity addressed therein. This may be either on the basis of a proposal to establish a new programme service, or to transfer an existing service to the frequency assigned to this regional licence. In the event of a successful application on the latter premise, the licensee is likely to be required, as a condition of the licence award, to relinquish its existing licence and associated frequency, for probable re-advertisement or for alternative use of the frequency elsewhere, within a period to be specified at the time of the regional licence award.
Application fee
15. The application fee payable for this licence, which is a category B licence (adult population between 1.0 and 4.5 million) on the FM waveband, is £5,900. A cheque for this sum, payable to the Radio Authority, must accompany each application submitted.
Date of licence advertisement: Thursday, 11 May, 2000.
Formal notice of advertisement placed in the 'Birmingham Evening Mail' and 'Express & Star' (Wolverhampton) of that date.
Issued by the Radio Authority, Holbrook House, 14 Great Queen Street, London, WC2B 5DG, tel. 020 7430 2724