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THE TRANSMISSION GALLERY
OLDHAM CIVIC CENTRE
| Photos by Ringway Manchester | Page last updated: 2024-08-06 |
| From 1994 Oldham Community Radio had broadcast a series of 9 short term trial ‘RSL’ broadcasts, which led to the successful application for a full time broadcast licence. By March 2007, Dave McGealy brought Oldham Community Radio to life and the station became one of the very first branches of community stations to be granted a licence. The station broadcasts a wide variety of programmes throughout the day for it's Oldham based listeners although the 25w transmitter reaches far beyond the Ofcom simulated coverage area. Oldham Community Radio is a not-for-profit organisation, whose volunteers come from diverse backgrounds, ages and abilities and freely give of their time and talents on and off-air. They have running costs of tens of thousands of pounds a year to stay on-air which need to be found by a mix of fundraising, grants, and sponsorship from local businesses and organisations. |
| Oldham community radio transmits from the top of Oldham Civic Centre, a 175ft tall concrete behemoth that had its own Cold War nuclear bunker built to protect senior councillors, council officers, police officers, engineers, doctors and communications experts in the event of a nuclear attack. |
| Today the roof is bristling with antennas and so its anyone’s guess which one belongs to Oldham Community Radio. The site sits 203m above sea level and the antenna itself is 65m high. |
| Looking at all of these antennas, its hard to determine which one is the Oldham Community Radio one but I’m going to go for this one, a Jaybeam similar to those used by other community radio stations. I could be wrong however but this one seems the most likely. (HIGHLIGHTED) |
| Oldham Market Hall (home to OCR's studios). I found no sign of a studio to transmitter link here. |
| Rear of the studios. |
| Nice sticker in the window. |
| This is David McGealy. He passed away on Monday 23rd October 2023 at the age of 74 after many years serving as a passionate and distinguished community-driven broadcaster. Dave's contribution to community radio spans decades, becoming the president and chairman at Radio Cavell, the first Royal Oldham Hospital radio service in the 1970s, before setting his sights on launching a local community radio station in the 1990’s. |
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