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  Home Page » News » Radio Station Boosts Power

Radio station boosts power

KDUR's switch to digital also allows for multiple broadcast streams

by Dale Rodebaugh
Herald Staff Writer A 110-foot tower set in place Tuesday at Fort Lewis College is the foundation for an antenna that will help radio station KDUR (91.9 FM and 93.9 FM) reach a wider audience and expand programming opportunities.

“We're increasing our power, and we're going digital," Ellen Stein, KDUR's director of development, said as she watched Durango-based Eagle Crane operator Damian Marcum lift sections of the 6-ton tower into place at the edge of Rim Drive.

The tower, which replaces an 80-foot antenna atop the campus College Union Building,  will be operable around the first of the year, Stein said. All that remains is to connect to the campus electrical system.

KDUR station manager Bryant Liggett said the biggest benefit from increasing power from 150 to 6,000 watts, going digital and locating the tower on Rim Drive will be filling dead zones.

“There are some weird spots like in Hermosa, the base of Farmington Hill and right below us around East Eighth Avenue and east College Drive where people don't hear us with the existing antenna," Liggett said. “Otherwise we're heard in Bondad, Hesperus and the ski area."

The tower, installed by contractor Arizona West Builders and Communications of Gilbert, Ariz., will accommodate an Alltel Wireless antenna.

KDUR had considered asking for bids to share the tower, but as grant deadlines loomed, directors invited participation by Alltel, which has its antenna nearby on a pole supporting softball field lighting, Stein said.

In its role as a community radio station, KDUR for 35 years has trained student and community volunteers as DJs, station managers and programmers. Broadcasting includes music, world and local news, and public-service announcements.

KDUR, located in the College Union Building, will have space in the Ballantine Media Center when the expansion of the student union is completed in 2011.

The station's beefed-up signal strength and its new digital capability - required by the Federal Communications Commission - will allow multiple streams of programming, Stein said. Campus sports or public forums could be broadcast at the same time as regular programming, Stein said. Reception of secondary streaming would be available only to people with HD radio or perhaps through the Internet.

KDUR received grants totaling $131,000 from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Department of Commerce's Public Telecommunications Facilities Program, Stein said. The college, KDUR and Alltel are sharing the remaining $369,000 of a project total of $400,000.

daler@durangoherald.com

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