[cma-l] The BBC will fund taking DAB up to 97% coverage

[Two Lochs Radio]

The BBC has confirmed it will pay for taking DAB coverage up from 90% to 97%, reaching all towns with a population greater than 5,000. Sadly (or not!), we don't have any towns with a population of over 5,000 within 50 miles of us! I presume also that it will continue doing this in our part of the UK with insufficient capacity on an inefficient single DAB multiplex to carry even all of its own national channels, let alone any community-based stations!

>From the Guardian:

The BBC has confirmed it will pay for the rollout of digital audio broadcasting (DAB) radio to 97% of the population, but culture minister Ed Vaizey has warned a "huge amount of work" remains to be done to get to switchover.

The corporation's director of audio and music, Tim Davie, said the BBC would fund the expansion of its national DAB platform – coverage currently stands at just over 90% – "despite the tough financial environment".

He said that every town with a population of more than 5,000 people would have indoor DAB coverage, but admitted that "small pockets of poor coverage in some of these areas" would remain.

Davie said the priority was "solid coverage" in the UK's top 25 cities, with boosts to the signal in areas including London, Leicester, Glasgow, Coventry and Swansea.

In a speech to the Drive to Digital conference at the BBC's Broadcasting House in central London on Tuesday, Davie eschewed mention of a switchover date – preferring to talk about "radio's digital hybrid future".

Vaizey picked up on the 2015 switchover target now effectively abandoned by the industry and said it "still has an important purpose".
"You will no doubt have heard the negatives of digital radio, there has certainly been no shortage of column inches devoted to the subject," he added.

"They often suggest that DAB is an out-of-date technology, that coverage and sound quality are inferior to analogue and listeners are already happy with what they've got, so why change?"

"There are of course elements of truth in all these statements," admitted the minister, a sentiment that may have sent eyebrows soaring towards Broadcasting House's newly-refurbished roof.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/oct/18/bbc-rollout-dab-radio
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