The Brookmans Park transmitting station is a facility for

medium wave Medium wave (MW) is a part of the medium frequency (MF) radio band used mainly for AM radio broadcasting. The spectrum provides about 120 channels with more limited sound quality than FM stations on the FM broadcast band. During the daytim ...

(MW) broadcasting at

Brookmans Park Brookmans Park is a village in Hertfordshire, southeast England, known for its Brookmans Park transmitting station, BBC transmitter station. Brookmans Park railway station, on the East Coast Main Line, is operated by Thameslink and Great North ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and one of the home counties. It borders Bedfordshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Essex to the east, Greater London to the ...

, north of London (). The station was built in the 1920s by the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

as the first of a network of regional dual ("twin wave" was the term then used) transmitter stations, replacing the city-based ones used previously, and this was to cover the Home Counties, London and South East. The station is now owned by

Arqiva Arqiva () is a British telecommunications company which provides infrastructure, broadcast transmission and smart meter facilities in the United Kingdom. The company is headquartered at the former Independent Broadcasting Authority headquart ...

and transmits

BBC Radio 5 Live BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It broadcasts mainly news, sport, Talk show, discussion, interviews and phone-ins, and is on air 24 hours a day. It is the principal BBC radio station Broadca ...

talkSPORT Talksport (styled as talkSPORT) is a sports radio station in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, owned by News Broadcasting. Its content includes live coverage of sporting events, interviews with the leading names in sport and entertai ...

Absolute Radio Absolute Radio is a British digital radio station owned and operated by Bauer Media Audio UK as part of the Absolute Radio Network. It broadcasts nationally across the UK via digital audio broadcasting. The station focuses on alternative ...

and Lyca Radio. Other medium wave broadcasts for London come from the Saffron Green transmitting station, built by the

Independent Broadcasting Authority The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was the regulatory body in the United Kingdom for commercial television ( ITV and Channel 4 and limited satellite television regulation – cable television was the responsibility of the Cable Author ...

and also in Hertfordshire.

History

The first station, on 842 kHz, (356m) 50 kW, went into service in on 21 October 1929, the second on 1148 kHz, (261m) initially 30 kW, followed on 9 March 1930. The original antenna configuration for the station was two

T-antenna A ‘T’-antenna, ‘T’-aerial, or flat-top antenna is a monopole antenna, monopole antenna (radio), radio antenna consisting of one or more horizontal wires suspended between two supporting radio masts and towers, radio masts or buildings and ...

s hung from four towers, one T-antenna to the north of the station and the other to the south of the station. Shortly after the commencement of transmissions, the channels were identified by a name denoting its function. The

BBC National Programme The BBC National Programme was a radio service which was on the air from 9 March 1930 – replacing the earlier BBC's experimental station 5XX – until 1 September 1939 when it was subsumed into the BBC Home Service, two days before the outb ...

was carried on 842 kHz, and the "

Regional In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as areas, zones, lands or territories, are portions of the Earth's surface that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and ...

" service on 1148 kHz. The transmitting station itself featured the latest transmitters from the

Marconi Company The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 which was a pioneer of wireless long distance communication and mass media broadcasting, eventually becoming on ...

. No public electricity supply was available so large generators were installed and an extensive support staff was recruited and trained by the BBC. In 1939, a mast was built on the south side of the station, which along with the existing south T-antenna made a

directional array An antenna array (or array antenna) is a set of multiple connected antennas which work together as a single antenna, to transmit or receive radio waves. The individual antennas (called ''elements'') are usually connected to a single receiver ...

pointing towards central London. This antenna configuration would be used after the war for the

BBC Light Programme The BBC Light Programme was a national radio station which broadcast chiefly mainstream light entertainment and light music from 1945 until 1967, when it was replaced by BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 2. It opened on 29 July 1945, taking over the ...

. During the Second World War an extension was added to the northern side of the transmitter building and a 140 kW STC transmitter was installed. In the mid-1950s a mast radiator was constructed on a field around north of station for the

BBC Home Service The BBC Home Service was a national and regional radio station that broadcast from 1939 until 1967, when it was replaced by BBC Radio 4. History 1922–1939: Interwar period Between the early 1920s and the outbreak of World War II, the BBC ...

and the original north T-antenna would become a reserve antenna for that service. The station was re-engineered in the late 1970s and an extra T-antenna (mini T) was hung between two poles constructed a few hundred feet north from the original north T-antenna, and new transmission equipment was installed replacing the original Marconi transmitters, the 140 kW STC transmitter, and other BBC-designed transmission equipment which was installed in the 1960s. After the re-engineering the south T-antenna and the mast transmitted BBC Radio London and Radio 3; the north T-antenna along with the newly installed mini T-antenna was used for Radio 1, and the mast was used for Radio 2. In the years since the re-engineering little has changed to the antenna and structure layout of the station, but the services have changed and the station now transmits Absolute Radio instead of Radio 3, Sunrise Radio instead of BBC Radio London, Talksport instead of Radio 1, and BBC Radio 5 Live instead of Radio 2. Much development has taken place and the station is now the home to many communications companies that operate various satellite and communication services.

Channels listed by frequency

Analogue radio (AM Medium Wave)

As of 16:00 on 4 February 2014. Sunrise Radio stopped transmitting. Lyca Media then started transmitting at 23:00 on 1458 kHz. The station was named as Lyca Radio at a later date. On 20 January 2023, Absolute Radio stopped broadcasting on 1215kHz, along with all its other AM frequencies across the UK.

Digital radio (DAB)

External links

The Transmission Gallery: photographs and information

* * * http://www.skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?b20122

References