Loss of radio stations is a blow to west side of DFW metroplex

Posted Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011 0 comments  Print Reprints
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By Bud Kennedy

bud@star-telegram.com

kennedy Rangers Ballpark gleamed for the World Series last week.

But one window remained sadly dark.

For 11 years, radio station KRLD/1080 AM delivered news and sports from a ballpark studio in center field, essentially atop the hyphen in Dallas-Fort Worth.

But KRLD moved to Dallas years ago. Its hosts rarely mention Tarrant County anymore.

By year's end, another of our show windows to the world will go dark.

WBAP/820 AM and 96.7 FM, part of Tarrant County since 1922, looks destined to move to Victory Park in Dallas with KSCS/96.3 FM as part of their sale to Atlanta-based Cumulus Media.

The two stations would leave Arlington to share a new studio with Cumulus' four Dallas stations, including KTCK/1310 "The Ticket" and KLIF/570 AM.

None of this has been officially announced yet. The deal was final only on Sept. 16.

But Cumulus is building Victory studios. According to the websites, WBAP and KLIF already share a program director and will share a new sales manager.

It's tough to argue that Cumulus should keep a separate studio in the WBAP/KSCS Brookhollow Two tower in Arlington.

But when we lose a radio or TV news station to Dallas, we lose more than an office tenant.

We lose influence. We lose leaders.

Most of all, we lose friends.

Eventually, we lose our role in the daily conversation about Dallas-Fort Worth.

WBAP and KSCS are what's left of the radio empire Amon Carter founded in 1922 at the Star-Telegram. We haven't been part of the same company since 1997, but barely a week goes by when somebody doesn't ask about Mark Davis, Hal Jay, "Hawkeye" Louis or one of the other anchors, most of them our neighbors.

Sure, they'll talk about us after they move. For a while.

But listen to KTCK or KLIF or CBS' KRLD. Except for KLIF/570 AM Wheels host Ed Wallace, a Star-Telegram columnist, those anchors rarely mention Fort Worth or Arlington. They quote Dallas newspapers and talk about nights out in Dallas.

For us, it's a huge step backward from the days when radio executive Ron Chapman's No. 1-rated stations promoted serving "Dallas and Fort Worth" and telling "a tale of two cities."

Maybe Fort Worth and Arlington leaders should get tuned in.

Bud Kennedy's column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 817-390-7538

Twitter@budkennedy

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