RW
To make things worse, they currently call themselves BBC WM 95.6 which is just too clunky - hopefully they will take the opportunity to drop the '95.6'.
It seems a bit dated now having the frequency as part of a station’s name. Many which did include it have dropped it over the past few years due to the many other ways of finding a radio station nowadays. And even on FM, surely most people these days just hit ‘seek’ until they find the station they want. It seems hardly worth promoting the frequency so prominently for the few people who still twiddle a knob (if you pardon the expression).
WM is in a crowded radio market compared to many other places, it's also easier to do it there as it's only on the one FM frequency, so I can understand why they do it. BBC London do/did a similar thing if I remember correctly.
Also happened in a couple of other areas - BBC Radio Oxford was 'BBC Oxford 95.2FM' for a while in the mid-2000s, and when Solent adopted the old LBC jingles in 1995, they became known as 'Solent 96.1 from the BBC' until they absorbed Dorset FM in 1996 when they shortened it to 'Solent from the BBC', then 'BBC Solent', and finally back to plain old 'BBC Radio Solent' by 1998.
The Radio Tees name change makes me wonder if the word 'Radio' is to be added into any other stations that currently lack it - the two obvious exceptions are BBC Hereford and Worcester where the name is already long enough, and BBC Essex - although Essex Radio/Essex FM has long since been assimilated into Heart, there is now a Radio Essex which prevents the BBC from using that name.
Robert Williams
Founding member
To make things worse, they currently call themselves BBC WM 95.6 which is just too clunky - hopefully they will take the opportunity to drop the '95.6'.
It seems a bit dated now having the frequency as part of a station’s name. Many which did include it have dropped it over the past few years due to the many other ways of finding a radio station nowadays. And even on FM, surely most people these days just hit ‘seek’ until they find the station they want. It seems hardly worth promoting the frequency so prominently for the few people who still twiddle a knob (if you pardon the expression).
WM is in a crowded radio market compared to many other places, it's also easier to do it there as it's only on the one FM frequency, so I can understand why they do it. BBC London do/did a similar thing if I remember correctly.
Also happened in a couple of other areas - BBC Radio Oxford was 'BBC Oxford 95.2FM' for a while in the mid-2000s, and when Solent adopted the old LBC jingles in 1995, they became known as 'Solent 96.1 from the BBC' until they absorbed Dorset FM in 1996 when they shortened it to 'Solent from the BBC', then 'BBC Solent', and finally back to plain old 'BBC Radio Solent' by 1998.
The Radio Tees name change makes me wonder if the word 'Radio' is to be added into any other stations that currently lack it - the two obvious exceptions are BBC Hereford and Worcester where the name is already long enough, and BBC Essex - although Essex Radio/Essex FM has long since been assimilated into Heart, there is now a Radio Essex which prevents the BBC from using that name.