CFM Radio
On 3 April 2023, almost 30 years to the day after launching as the station rebranded to Greatest Hits Radio with the previous breakfast show host Robbie Dee began presenting the 1pm - 4pm afternoon show, until the closure of the Carlisle studios on Friday 27 September 2024.
As of March 2024, the station has a weekly audience of 75,000 listeners according to RAJAR.
History
The station was launched by its original owners, Border Television at 8am on 14 April 1993 when managing director and breakfast show host John Myers played "The Best" by Tina Turner as its first song.
Originally CFM only broadcast from their Caldbeck mast to Carlisle on 96.4 MHz and Penrith, from the top of Beacon Hill, on 102.5 MHz. In September 1995, they also started transmitting to West Cumbria from their transmitters at Broughton Moor (102.2 MHz) and Whitehaven (103.4 MHz).
From its launch, the station broadcast from premises adjacent to the ITV Border studios in Durranhill, Carlisle. In April 2010, CFM moved to a new base at Atlantic House in Kingstown, Carlisle.
In 2005, Emap bought CFM and branded it as one of its Big City Network of stations. Three years later, Emap was bought by Bauer.
Previously, CFM has won numerous industry awards including the Radio Academy's North West Station of the Year 2005 and Emap Station of the Year 2006. In May 2013, CFM became the first radio station to broadcast from a nuclear reprocessing site at Sellafield, West Cumbria.
CFM was one of two stations within the Hits Radio Network that did not broadcast on DAB (the other being Radio Borders based in Galashiels). This was due to the lack of local DAB multiplexes in Cumbria. However, in May 2019, Ofcom announced plans to advertise three local multiplexes in Cumbria & South West Scotland. Bauer made the sole application to Ofcom to run the North & West Cumbria DAB Multiplex, stating that they planned to place CFM as well as other Bauer owned stations on it, alongside BBC Radio Cumbria. In December 2019, Ofcom confirmed that the multiplex licence would be awarded to Bauer Digital Radio, with the multiplex originally expected to begin transmission in late 2020. However, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, this had been pushed back to 1 December 2021.
On 1 December 2021, the DAB Multiplex for North and West Cumbria was switched on (the subsequent multiplex for South Cumbria and North Lancashire owned by MuxCo was also switched on but does not carry the same stations as the Bauer owned one), and CFM along with a number of other Bauer owned radio stations as well as BBC Radio Cumbria began broadcasting for the first time on DAB in the area.
On 26th September 2024 it was announced that the Carlisle studios will be closing on Friday 27th September and the local afternoon show will end. Instead the station will take the National afternoon show as the Breakfast Show broadcast from Liverpool counts as a local show, this ends all locally broadcast programming on this station.
Network programming approval
In March 2021, it was announced that Bauer had received approval for full networking in North West England. It was hinted that CFM may move from its Carlisle studios to Bauer's Radio City Liverpool studios in the Radio City Tower, or the network's Manchester headquarters. It was also expressed that Bauer may reduce CFM's local programming to the minimum legal requirement of 3 hours per day.
On 21 April 2022, Bauer announced that local programming outside weekday breakfast would be replaced with further networked output from Hits Radio. Local news bulletins and traffic updates were not affected.
On 26 September 2024, Bauer announced that its remaining local programme presented by Robbie Dee would be ending on 27 September due to the closure of the station’s Carlisle studios on the same day. The last remaining local programme ended at 4:00pm on the same day. The move marked the official end of all local programming for the station as all programming for the station comes from the Greatest Hits Radio network.[1]
Programming
Networked programming originates from Bauer's studios in Manchester, Liverpool, London, Birmingham and Glasgow.
Local programming was produced and broadcast from Bauer's Carlisle studios on weekdays from 1-4pm until the closure of the Carlisle studios on 27 September 2024.[2]
News
Bauer's Manchester newsroom broadcasts local news bulletins hourly from 6am-7pm on weekdays and from 7am-1pm on weekends. Headlines are broadcast on the half-hour during weekday breakfast and drivetime shows, alongside traffic bulletins.
National bulletins from Sky News Radio are carried overnight with bespoke networked bulletins on weekend afternoons, usually originating from Bauer's Manchester newsroom.
Notable past presenters
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Dave Campbell
References
- ^ "RAJAR".
- ^ "CFM gains approval for full North West networking". RadioToday. 2 March 2021. Retrieved 5 April 2022.
- ^ "More Hits Radio network programming for five Bauer radio stations". Radio Today. 21 April 2022. Retrieved 21 April 2022.
- ^ GHR (Cumbria) - Public File
- ^ GHR (Cumbria) - Public File
