22 replies to this topic

[Mr_E_Squirrel]

Looks like it is going off air and to an online platform. I remember listening to Howie Seigels radio show on that station..

Victoria, B.C. - Victoria’s Global Roots music station Village 900 announced today that preparations are complete and on March 4th the station will move its activities entirely onto its digital distribution platform villagenow.net.


http://www.villageno...olution-to.html

[Langford Rat]

I remember CJVI back around 1970 or so. Their music format was called “AC” (almost contemporary). A pretty strange stew with a lot of your parent’s music mixed in. CKDA was our best local choice for music but if you had a good transistor radio, on a good day we could get “KJR, Seattle, channel ninety-fiiiiive”

[G-Man]

That is too bad. As it is my fallback station when driving. They have a great reggae show.

[Hotel Mike]

Very sorry to see it go off the AM dial. Great music to listen to.

[AllseeingEye]

Yup lots of old Victoria radio heritage there; I have several old B & W still pics from the late 50's when my father worked there with an equally young Joe Easingwood. Especially fun to see the old vintage master control room equipment way before the PC-computer-digital age.

[Bernard]

AM 900, formerly CJVI, is the oldest radio station in Victoria. The station went on the air Easter Sunday 1923. Initially as CFCL, a Christian radio station, then it was CFCT and no longer Christian, and then it became CJVI in 1941 when the Times Colonist bought it.

It has been AM 900 since the spring of 1945.

Until 1950 it was the only radio station in Victoria. In that year CKDA signed on. The CKDA/CKXM AM broadcasts ended in May 2000.

The end of CKMO AM 900 means there will be a single local AM radio station, up until 1997, Victoria had 3 AM stations and only 3 FM stations. Now it will be 8 FM and 1 AM

[G-Man]

Just because the Village 900 is moving to digital does not mean that someone else cannot begin broadcasting on AM 900.

[Langford Rat]

If this keeps up, Christy will have to start mailing her speeches to us.

[Bernard]

Just because the Village 900 is moving to digital does not mean that someone else cannot begin broadcasting on AM 900.

Someone would have to apply for a licence for the frequency. AM is not cheap to use because the broadcast equipment is more expensive power draw is more. This is why all the other campus/community radio stations in Canada are on FM. You can put a 20 watt FM station on the air for less than $5K, I did it once for under $1,000.

The only reason the Village could make it work is because Rogers was paying the costs.

[Sparky]

If this keeps up, Christy will have to start mailing her speeches to us.

That was VERY funny.

[Phil McAvity]

....up until 1997, Victoria had 3 AM stations and only 3 FM stations. Now it will be 8 FM and 1 AM

And little wonder given the atrocious sound quality of AM. All it's really good for is talk radio. As a teenager growing up in the eighties I remember having to suffer through only having CKDA 1220 to listen to locally. A buddy of mine in high school had cable hooked up to his stereo so he could pull in all the Vancouver and Seattle FM rock stations. I was so jealous. I signed an on-line petition in the mid-eighties to get an FM rock station here (it was long overdue) so when the Q arrived in 1987 I felt like my prayers had been answered and of course since then the FM rock market here has exploded with increasing specialized stations.

As far as the topic goes, congrats to G-Man for being the only person i've ever heard of who listened to the village.

[Holden West]

And little wonder given the atrocious sound quality of AM. All it's really good for is talk radio. As a teenager growing up in the eighties I remember having to suffer through only having CKDA 1220 to listen to locally. A buddy of mine in high school had cable hooked up to his stereo so he could pull in all the Vancouver and Seattle FM rock stations. I was so jealous. I signed an on-line petition in the mid-eighties to get an FM rock station here (it was long overdue) so when the Q arrived in 1987 I felt like my prayers had been answered and of course since then the FM rock market here has exploded with increasing specialized stations.

That's pretty much my feelings, too. Those kids with the cable-stereos had it made. 900 AM was always difficult to tune correctly compared to C-FAX and CKDA. The arrival of 100.3 the Q (originally supposed to be Q92) was a long-overdue revelation. FM rock in Victoria! A miracle!

The question I want to know is, does the frequency have any true value today?

[AllseeingEye]

Have to agree with Phil and Holden - I well remember the day in ~ 1976 when I figured it out, hooked a live (TV) cable into the top of the antenna of my AM radio and !PRESTO! hearing the resonant tones of Steve Slayton of the mighty KZOK in Seattle playing some heretofor unknown (to me) band named Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes - up until then you can bet your mortgage payment you never heard the likes of Terrible Ted on Victoria AM ....ah, revelation, joy and bliss all at once.

[Holden West]

I mostly remember CJVI when it played country music. The 80s were not country's golden era for sure. That and broadcasts of Cougar hockey games.

[Nparker]

I signed an on-line petition in the mid-eighties...

Where did you find anything ONLINE in the mid-eighties???

[Sparky]

Where did you find anything ONLINE in the mid-eighties???

Islandnet was the first commercial Internet Service Provider in Victoria founded in 1993. There was also Freenet, which was available slightly before that, originally only accessible from the library.

My Freenet user number was "UN029".

Islandnet was only available as "dialup" and was painfully slow. They only had 25 access lines and people had to rush home from work to be able to log on, otherwise busy signal.

My daughters have a hard time believing this story. They think it falls into the "walk two miles to school in the snow" category.

I am also struggling with the dates provided in this thread regarding the availability of FM reception in Victoria. I bought my first Fisher tuner in the early 70's. But in all fairness, the late 60's and early 70's are a bit of a blur.

[Mike K.]

Village 900 is apparently facing a complete shut down of operations by the end of April. The radio station aired its last radio broadcast on March 4th and moved to a completely online broadcast accessed through www.villagenow.net

[G-Man]

Shocking that they would not have a huge online audience... I guess they should have kept the radio going. Couldn't they have just gone low power and broadcast to a couple of miles around Camosun?

[VicHockeyFan]

Shocking that they would not have a huge online audience... I guess they should have kept the radio going. Couldn't they have just gone low power and broadcast to a couple of miles around Camosun?

Operating at low power would save money?

http://www2.canada.c...80-7ed1593a67e3

I dunno, I'm not impressed all that much with their communication grads.

[Mike K.]

A lot of people listen to radio while driving around. Online radio is a niche market and seems to only have a following by those who listen to a traditional radio broadcast when they can.