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Site of the Week 2/21/2020: Southern Connecticut

Scott Fybush by Scott Fybush
February 21, 2020
in Connecticut, Free Content, Tower Site of the Week
0

Text and photos by SCOTT FYBUSH

Some markets we get to only once, and we’re pushing ourselves to see everything in the space of just a few days.

And some markets we see in little bits and pieces over the course of many years. So it is with southern Connecticut – we’ve been visiting stations there on and off for a long time, one or two each visit, often with an “apizza” break in New Haven along the way.

WYBC-FM on West Rock
WYBC-FM aux on West Rock
West Rock
West Rock

In the spring of 2018, we took a couple of days before the NAB Show to add a few more notches to the list, including a prominent site we’d often seen from down below but never up close.

West Rock
West Rock
WEBE 108
WEBE 108

That site shown above and at left is “West Rock,” the stony outcropping that rises above the Wilbur Cross Parkway just northwest of New Haven.

It’s been a broadcast site at least since the late 1980s, when the Yale-affiliated WYBC-FM (94.3) moved up here from its original site atop the Yale gym.

That’s the original WYBC-FM antenna (I think) from 1987 on that center tower, later replaced by a newer one-bay antenna on the tower to the right. This compound in the middle of West Rock State Park is also home to several translators – the “Bomba” 102.3 relay of Full Power Radio’s Spanish hits network, iHeart’s “100.9 the Beat” (fed by WKCI 101.3-HD2), a Connecticut Public Radio relay on 89.1 – and the one we at Fybush Media helped do for WFIF (1500), W270DL on 101.9.

WEBE 108
WEBE 108
WPKN hallway
WPKN hallway

From West Rock, we headed down the Wilbur Cross (looking up again at West Rock as we passed through the tunnel that runs beneath it), chasing the last bits of daylight as we pulled into the University of Bridgeport campus near the edge of Long Island Sound.

The parking lot provides a nice view across to the power plant whose smokestack carries the antenna of WEBE (107.9), at least for now; WEBE has a CP to move off this unusual site and up to Booth Hill in Trumbull, and we really need to get there for the tour before that happens.

Up the stairs to WPKN
Up the stairs to WPKN
WPKN hallway
WPKN hallway

Booth Hill is the transmitter site of the station whose studios we’re here to see: WPKN (89.5), which began in 1963 as the University of Bridgeport’s station.

WPKN went independent more than a decade ago, though its studios stayed right here on the university campus, where they’re something of a time capsule – as well as a staging ground for some of the most diverse, creative, engaging freeform community radio anywhere out there.

The hallway outside the WPKN studios is a typical blocky example of 1950s campus architecture; inside, it’s a long warren of studios and offices where every available flat surface appears to have been colonized by CD and LP shelving.

WPKN main air studio
WPKN main air studio
WPKN main air studio
WPKN main air studio

The main air studio anchors one end of the complex, and it kind of looks exactly the way WPKN sounds – a little dimly lit, surrounded by music, and always with someone live at the controls.

A WPKN studio
A WPKN studio
WPKN meeting room
WPKN meeting room

There’s a meeting room in the middle of the complex that can also be used as a live music studio (with adjoining control room), and I think that’s a board meeting that was getting started in there this particular evening.

A WPKN studio
WPKN “AM studio”
Vintage WPKN gear
Vintage WPKN gear

At the other end of the line of studios is what’s still labeled on the door as the “AM Studio,” a relic of the early days when the university had a carrier-current AM station alongside the noncommercial FM; these days, this room is used for production and pre-recording. Beyond that are station offices and a crowded record library. You never know just what might be getting pulled from these shelves and getting spun on the 89.5 airwaves (and these days, on the stream that has a worldwide following…)

WNHH-LP
WNHH-LP
WNHH-LP
WNHH-LP

And we close with one more community station, on a smaller scale: in the heart of downtown New Haven, up a steep flight of stairs from Elm Street, WNHH-LP (103.5) operates from studios in the bustling offices of the New Haven Independent and La Voz community news organizations. The “Independent” operates WNHH in English for most of the day from the small studio shown above, but there’s also programming from La Voz in Spanish, coming from a bigger studio at the end of the hall.

Thanks to WPKN’s Alec Cumming for the tour!

CALENDARS ON CLEARANCE

If you don’t have your 2023 Tower Site Calendar yet, now is the perfect time to get it. Because we have lowered the price to just $14.

The calendar has great photos of broadcast sites near and far (everywhere from Navajo Nation on the cover to Boston to Toronto to Texas, and beyond), plus a lovely “centerfold” you can keep on your wall for 2024.

It’s still shipping regularly, and you can have yours in just a couple of days!

Order your copy and you’ll see what we mean.

If you have already ordered your calendar, make sure you check out the other items in the store, too!

And don’t miss a big batch of southern Connecticut IDs next Wednesday, over at our sister site, TopHour.com!

Next week: From Hartford to Willimantic

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Tags: W270DLWEBEWNHH-LPWPKNWYBC-FM
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Scott Fybush

Scott Fybush

Editor/Publisher, NorthEast Radio Watch and Tower Site of the Week

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