BBC Radio Cumbria is the BBC's local radio station serving the county of

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumb ...

. It broadcasts on FM, AM, DAB, digital TV and via

BBC Sounds BBC Sounds is a Closed platform, walled garden streaming media and audio download service from the BBC that includes live radio broadcasts, audio on demand, and podcasts. The service is available on a wide range of devices, including mobile pho ...

from studios in

Carlisle Carlisle ( , ; from xcb, Caer Luel) is a city that lies within the Northern England, Northern English county of Cumbria, south of the Anglo-Scottish border, Scottish border at the confluence of the rivers River Eden, Cumbria, Eden, River C ...

. According to

RAJAR Radio Joint Audience Research Limited (RAJAR) was established in 1992 to operate a single audience measurement system for the radio industry in the United Kingdom. RAJAR is jointly owned by the BBC and RadioCentre. RAJAR's predecessor was calle ...

, the station has a weekly audience of 71,000 listeners and a 6.1% share as of September 2022.

History

The county of Cumbria, from which the station takes its current name, was not created until 1974. Radio Cumbria began service on 24 November 1973 as BBC Radio Carlisle and could be received across most of the former county of

Cumberland Cumberland ( ) is a historic county in the far North West England. It covers part of the Lake District as well as the north Pennines and Solway Firth coast. Cumberland had an administrative function from the 12th century until 1974. From 19 ...

. The station adopted its current name shortly before its tenth anniversary in May 1982, when its service was expanded to cover the whole of the administrative county of Cumbria, namely: * The former counties of Cumberland and

Westmorland Westmorland (, formerly also spelt ''Westmoreland'';R. Wilkinson The British Isles, Sheet The British IslesVision of Britain/ref> is a historic county in North West England spanning the southern Lake District and the northern Dales. It had an ...

* The former exclave of Lancashire " North of the Sands" * The small area of the former West Riding of Yorkshire, around Sedbergh and Dent, that had been moved from Yorkshire into Cumbria.

BBC Radio Furness opt-out

From the launch of the renamed station, between 25 May 1982 and 1991, an opt-out service, BBC Radio Furness operated in the south of the county at peak times – originally breakfast and lunchtimes on weekdays, and Saturday mornings. Programmes were produced in

Barrow-in-Furness Barrow-in-Furness is a port town in Cumbria, England. Historically in Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1867 and merged with Dalton-in-Furness Urban District in 1974 to form the Borough of Barrow-in-Furness. In 2023 the ...

and used 96.1 MHz and 837 kHz. This meant that, in addition to the Furness area, Radio Furness could be received along the south coast of Cumbria, in parts of the Lake District, and the west coast as far as Millom. "Radio Furness" lost its separate branding in 1991 but breakfast and afternoon opt-outs for the South Lakes and Furness continued until 1994. As a result of BBC cutbacks in the 1990s, programme opt-outs were curtailed although the Barrow studios remained staffed. The former studio in Hartington Street is now the local headquarters for the Labour Party.

Background

Radio Cumbria claims to be listened to by one-third of the county's population, despite having to face the challenge of an area that is sparsely populated and predominantly rural, with the biggest urban areas around its perimeter. Most programming has a similar format to that of other BBC local radio stations, although one unique feature is the seasonal ''Lamb Bank'' – a short daily segment which carries announcements from

farmer A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, raising living organisms for food or raw materials. The term usually applies to people who do some combination of raising field crops, orchards, vineyards, poultry, or other livestock. A farmer mig ...

s wishing to exchange

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...

Technical

On FM, Radio Cumbria broadcasts to northern Cumbria on 95.6 MHz ( Sandale) – suitable for drivers on the M6 north of Penrith – and to the south of the county on 96.1 MHz (

Morecambe Bay Morecambe Bay is a large estuary in northwest England, just to the south of the Lake District National Park. It is the largest expanse of intertidal mudflats and sand in the United Kingdom, covering a total area of . In 1974, the second larges ...

), with lower-powered relays on 95.2 MHz ( Kendal), 104.1 MHz (

Whitehaven Whitehaven is a town and port on the English north west coast and near to the Lake District National Park in Cumbria, England. Historically in Cumberland, it lies by road south-west of Carlisle and to the north of Barrow-in-Furness. It i ...

) and 104.2 MHz (

Windermere Windermere (sometimes tautology (language), tautologically called Windermere Lake to distinguish it from the nearby town of Windermere, Cumbria (town), Windermere) is the largest natural lake in England. More than 11 miles (18 km) in leng ...

). It also broadcasts on medium wave: 756 kHz (Brisco –

), 837 kHz (

) and 1458 kHz (

). The Kendal, Morecambe Bay and Sandale transmitters have

BBC National DAB BBC National DAB is a digital audio broadcasting multiplex in the UK, for a number of radio stations which have UK wide coverage. The multiplex is owned and operated by the BBC and is transmitted from a number of transmitter sites across the co ...

, as well as a transmitter at Penrith Beacon.

Digital One Digital One is a national commercial digital radio multiplex in the United Kingdom, owned by Arqiva. , the multiplex covered more than 90% of the population from 137 transmitters. Coverage was extended to Northern Ireland in July 2013. It cont ...

comes from Morecambe Bay and Penrith. MXR North West comes from Morecambe Bay. Until 1 December 2021, BBC Radio Cumbria was the only BBC local radio station that did not broadcast on DAB. The station is available on DAB+,

Freeview Freeview may refer to: * Freeview (Australia), the marketing name for the digital terrestrial television platform in Australia * Freeview (New Zealand), a digital satellite and digital terrestrial television platform in New Zealand *Freeview (UK), ...

TV channel 721 and streams online via

Programming

Local programming is produced and broadcast from the BBC's Carlisle studios from 6 am – 10 pm on weekdays, 6 am – 1 am on Saturdays and Sundays. The late show, airing from 10 pm – 1 am, originates from

BBC Radio Lancashire BBC Radio Lancashire is the BBC's local radio station serving the county of Lancashire. It broadcasts on FM, AM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios on Darwen Street in Blackburn. According to RAJAR, the station has a weekly aud ...

on Monday - Thursday nights and

BBC Radio Newcastle BBC Radio Newcastle is the BBC's local radio station serving Newcastle upon Tyne, the neighbouring metropolitan boroughs, Northumberland and north east County Durham. It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from BBC studio ...

on Friday - Sunday nights. During the station's downtime, BBC Radio Cumbria simulcasts overnight programming from

BBC Radio 5 Live BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that broadcasts mainly news, sport, discussion, interviews and phone-ins. It is the principal BBC radio station covering sport in the United Kingdom, broadcast ...

and

BBC Radio London BBC Radio London is the Local BBC Radio, BBC's local radio station serving Greater London and its surrounding areas. The station broadcasts across the area and beyond, on the 94.9 FM broadcasting, FM frequency, Digital Audio Broadcasting, DAB, ...

BBC Radio Cumbria Sport/BBC Sport Cumbria

The station's sport service provides exclusive commentary on Cumbria's two professional

English Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engl ...

clubs, Carlisle United and Barrow, along with exclusive commentaries on the county's three semi-professional rugby league clubs,

Barrow Raiders The Barrow Raiders are a semi-professional rugby league team in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, England. The club was formed in 1875 as Barrow Football Club. For the 1995–96 and 1996 seasons the club was known as Barrow Braves, becoming the Ba ...

Workington Town Workington Town R.L.F.C. is a semi-professional rugby league club playing in Workington in west Cumbria. Their stadium is Derwent Park, which they share with Workington Comets, a speedway team. They became Rugby League Champions in 1951 and ...

and

BBC Cumbria Sport can also be found on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

a
BBC Sport Cumbria on Twitter
and on

. The station's sport department won a

Radio Academy Award The Radio Academy Awards, started in 1983, were the most prestigious awards in the British radio industry. For most of their existence, they were run by ZAFER Associates, but in latter years were brought under the control of The Radio Academy ...

in 2003 for its Saturday Sport show, a Carlisle United. debate, facing competition in the Sport category from

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is an international broadcasting, international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the Government of the United Kingdom, British Government through the Foreign Secretary, Foreign Secretary's o ...

Capital Gold The Capital Gold radio station started in London in 1988 on Capital Radio's AM frequency, after the Independent Broadcasting Authority had urged stations to end simulcasting (broadcasting the same programmes simultaneously on AM and FM) and t ...

and

. The judges said: ''The programme was firmly rooted in its community, knowledgeable of its audience and subject matter and covered the issues head-on with confidence. This debate was well produced and was skilfully presented and chaired by Paul Newton and Graham Moss. The programme developed its themes with a well-judged crescendo, creating passionate and gripping radio.''

Notable former presenters

* Adrian Allen * Richard Hammond *

Richard Madeley Richard Holt Madeley ( born 13 May 1956) is an English television presenter and writer. Alongside his wife Judy Finnigan, he presented '' This Morning'' and the chat show '' Richard & Judy''. Madeley's solo projects include the ITV series '' F ...

* John Myers *

Helen Skelton Helen Elizabeth Skelton (born 19 July 1983) is an English television presenter and Actor, actress. She co-presented the BBC children's programme ''Blue Peter'' from 2008 until 2013, and since 2014 has been a presenter on ''Countryfile''. She als ...

* Alan Smith *

Norman Thomas Norman Mattoon Thomas (November 20, 1884 – December 19, 1968) was an American Presbyterian minister who achieved fame as a socialist, pacifist, and six-time presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America. Early years Thomas was the ...

* Frank Wappat

References

{{coord, 54.8958, N, 2.9408, W, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Radio stations established in 1973 1973 establishments in England

Mass media in Cumbria Furness Radio stations in Cumbria