MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Content on WAJR-AM can now be heard full-time on 104.5-FM.
Through the acqusition of an FM repeater, WAJR-AM on 1440 can now also be heard simultaneously on 104.5-FM.
“The goal really is to make the great radio stations like WAJR and others that exist on AM currently more accessible,” West Virginia Radio’s Corporate Director of Technology Chris Moran said Monday on WAJR’s Morgantown AM. “As a company, we’ve been doing that for years in other ways.”
In addition to WAJR’s live web stream, IHeartRadio, and simulcast on WVAQ’s HD-3 channel, the news/talk station’s foray into an FM repeater will allow for greater coverage in news, sports, and traffic through a larger part of the region for longer periods of time.
“It’s absolutely listenable in Fairmont at all times,” Moran said. “It’s a really nice footprint, I think.”
Moran said the station now has a very strong signal in Cheat Lake, seven miles north of the state line on I-79, and into the western end of Monongalia County towards Hundred.
“This footprint greatly exceeds WAJR’s night-time coverage,” Moran said.
Most cell phone’s carry FM tuners, which Moran said will make WAJR’s complete programming more accessible.
“You would never be able to put an AM tuner in a device as small as a cell phone with all of the other electronics in there because of interference,” he said.
“This launch of 104.5-FM in Morgantown is really a big step in making WAJR more accessible over the air to more people.”
For long-time listeners of WAJR-AM, content will not change. It will simply be more widely available — especially for night-time sports broadcasts
“Whatever we do, it’s going to be the exact same content on 104.5-FM that it is on WAJR 1440 AM,” WAJR Program Director Kyle Wiggs said.
104.5-FM went live Thursday, Nov. 30.