Someday the CKAV story will make for a great book, but it is unfortunately politically charged as hell, and it's not my story to tell.   

When it was obvious that the CKAV stations were hopelessly lost, and probably about to lose their licences, a group of Broadcasters got together and offered, on a volunteer basis to help out as much as we could.  Offering production, scheduling, management, sales and any and all other advice and execution we could.  Unfortunately our 'life support' efforts were too little, too late.  The restaurant had sold far too many bad meals and made too many broken promises to remain in business.

I believe, had CKAV been able to fund the legal representation for their appeal they would have won at least a short reprieve and chance for the 'fixed' aspects of the COL to be recognized.  We were well on the way, meeting COL in most areas with the exception of local studios which was a budgetary impossibility at that stage.  The CRTC were wrong basing the performance of an entire network of stations on audio tapes from 6-9 months before a recovery mission had started, from one market, and had little to no proof of many of the accusations that Jean-Pierre Blais felt comfortable making.  But again.. water under the bridge, and to be honest the debts that had been incurred over the months and years were insurmountable by that stage of the story.

Having said that, during the existence of CKAV and till we offered to help get things at least somewhere close to back on track, there was breathtaking financial abuse on the part of upper management, but also on the part of CBC and others who rented tower space to AVR at ludicrous rates.  I don't know who initially negotiated the AVR contracts but they were absolutely taken for a ride.   To be honest, and of course hindsight is 20/20, anyone looking back can see the original model was critically flawed from the start.  There's just no way they could ever have generated enough in sales to cover the monthly transmission nut alone, never mind staff, upkeep, content etc.  Especially with the egregious upper management salary structure that was originally in place.

The CRTC also carry some responsibility as do the initial engineers because of the absolute shit broadcast patterns  in Toronto and Vancouver that were accepted, not to mention the COL commitments on spoken word.  Even a fresh humber radio graduate could have looked at the talk commitment and realized over 5 stations, out of the gate, this was a multi-million dollar proposition.   The CRTC should have used it's expertise to explain some of these braodcast basics before allowing the application to succeed, least of which looking for better frequencies and patterns.  Was it their job to do that?  Possibly not, but that's why 'hearings' are heard,  as opposed to just rubber stamping licence requests.  The CKAV applicants were, IMHO, failed by their peers.  Unfortunately in the early days I think people were more excited about getting a stick lit up than the geographic area the signal would end up penetrating.   Even secondary incomes using the SCMO couldn't be realized since the sub-carrier was only as good (okay a bit less) than the main one.  The CRTC also spectacularly failed in not auditing the very generous CCD contributions that were made over the years.  "Repeated requests for detailed accounts were not met with success' was where it was left.  Maybe CRA would have had better success at getting answers, but it doesn't matter now.  

The other issue as I've said pretty openly before was target market concentration.  Had these been AM frequencies with the ability to cover the province, rather than, in the case of Toronto, barely able to make it to the outskirts of the M postal code, the story would have been different.   During our 'life support' CKAV days one of the things we explored, but just didn't have the time to approach was FM re-broadcasters over specific parts of the province where the signal couldn''t be heard but definitely should have been.   Having scheduled the stations with 40% cancon and 8-12% indigenous music I'm acutely aware that there is some truly incredible music out there, and it can easily fit into a format that is acceptable to a very wide audience.   Maybe with their ongoing partnership with Corus, and the reach of Fresh in Hamilton and Big in Kingston, I wonder if the station could be rebroadcast on an HD sub-channel in those markets.  I believe it would then become a true force and beacon across the province.

For every bad issue that existed along the way, there were many real people putting their hearts, souls, time, money, talent..  everything (and more) into the original project to make it work.  Unfortunately there were others taking advantage of that at every step of the way.   As one person described it, it was like trying to bail out a leaking row boat, only to find someone sitting in the back seat with a bigger bucket, pouring water into it faster than it could be drained.

It will be interesting to see how it plays out, but knowing Dave Charles I also know how passionate he is about 2 very important areas that will make this work.  Making sure the indigenous voices are clearly represented, heard and woven into the overall broadcast fabric, not just there as a COL.  Also, importantly, they will be presented on a professional platform, executed and programed properly, that has a real potential to be profitable. 

I'm crossing everything I have that this works for everyone involved.  

Remember to include "fm" in their website address. 
If not, do they have any relation to these guys? https://www.elmnt.ca/

(or Cornwall for that matter) Big in HD may be incentive enough for them, I'm sure with Queens they could come up with some creative uses for the sub channels, and at the absolute minimum, with 2 FM's in that market, it would be great CRTC hearing at-a-boy stuff for them.  

RadioAaron wrote:

ig wrote:

Maybe with their ongoing partnership with Corus, and the reach of Fresh in Hamilton and Big in Kingston, I wonder if the station could be rebroadcast on an HD sub-channel in those markets.  I believe it would then become a true force and beacon across the province.
 

Interesting idea. Fresh Hamilton would be a no-brainer; they could turn that on tomorrow. Big in Kingston is another matter -- who would pay for that? There's no incentive for Corus to otherwise turn on HD on that signal.

 

CFPT - 106.5 - Toronto - 2.600 watts
CFPO - 95.7 - Ottawa - 9,100 watts

Both stations have also been approved to operate HD channels.
 

They are now testing their FM signal. Just heard it in the car.

I wish my friends connected with this project nothing but an astonishing launch and plenty of ongoing, accruing street talk followed by truly shocking ratings success.

It's blast off time Magoo!!!  Blow 'em up real good.

Last edited by Lee Marshall (October 20, 2018 12:48 am)

Are they on air now [I can't hear them here]? Their web site is still blank

Last edited by andysradio (October 24, 2018 2:53 pm)

andysradio wrote:

Are they on air now [I can't hear them here]? Their web site is still blank

They signed on a few seconds after noon. Ironically, for a station that seems dedicated to music from the 80s, 90s and 2000s, their first song was from the 50s.

You can hear it and the sign-on around the 33:14 mark on their Facebook page video at the link that Scraps posted above. 

I tried the station in the car again this morning and signal was still poor. Some interference from WYRK sporadically which I do not recall on the old station. WYRK was more or less wiped out but now with a directional antenna fans may still be able to tune in. That old signal while not great was quite a bit better. In order to get GTA wide ratings they will need to improve the signal.

In terms of format what I heard this morning sounds like a somewhat more eclectic version of a hot ac format with a bit of aboriginal content. 

Last edited by Fitz (November 1, 2018 9:07 am)

What am I doing wrong?  I hit the button for Listen Live; on their web site and nothing happens.  No Sound.

Last edited by AMFM (November 1, 2018 9:38 am)

AMFM wrote:

What am I doing wrong?  I hit the button for Listen Live; on their web site and nothing happens.  No Sound.

Look for an arrow beside "On now", after clicking Listen Live.

The playlist is not far from a CHUM FM type format.  I guess people just cant seem to stray away from the Top 40 nonsense.

Im loving Q107 right now.

mikew wrote:

Im loving Q107 right now.


WHY?
 

Not enough Motorhead, natch.

Maybe 106.5 was not the best frequency for this new station or they need an increase in power. The last couple of days reception has been intermittent with WYRK Buffalo drowning out their signal as close to downtiwn as Yonge and 401. And appears they’ve turned off their HD. Doesn’t seem to be helping much.