The Westerglen transmitting station is a facility for

longwave In radio, longwave, long wave or long-wave, and commonly abbreviated LW, refers to parts of the radio spectrum with wavelengths longer than what was originally called the medium-wave broadcasting band. The term is historic, dating from the e ...

and

mediumwave Medium wave (MW) is the part of the medium frequency (MF) radio band used mainly for AM radio broadcasting. The spectrum provides about 120 channels with more limited sound quality than FM stations on the FM broadcast band. During the dayti ...

broadcasting established in 1932 at Westerglen Farm, 2 miles (3 km) south west of Falkirk,

Stirlingshire Stirlingshire or the County of Stirling, gd, Siorrachd Sruighlea) is a historic county and registration countyRegisters of Scotland. Publications, leaflets, Land Register Counties. of Scotland. Its county town is Stirling. It borders Perth ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

(). Four medium wave radio programmes are broadcast from the site on frequencies of 810, 909, 1089 and 1215 kHz and a long wave service on 198 kHz. There are three guyed steel lattice

mast radiator Mast, MAST or MASt may refer to: Engineering * Mast (sailing), a vertical spar on a sailing ship * Flagmast, a pole for flying a flag * Guyed mast, a structure supported by guy-wires * Mooring mast, a structure for docking an airship * Radio ma ...

s on the site, which are insulated against ground. These carry combinations of the above services. There is a shorter fourth mast that carries non broadcast services. One of the masts carries the long wave transmission in a synchronised group with the transmitters at

Droitwich Droitwich Spa (often abbreviated to Droitwich ) is an historic spa town in the Wychavon district in northern Worcestershire, England, on the River Salwarpe. It is located approximately south-west of Birmingham and north-east of Worcester. The ...

and

Burghead Burghead ( sco, Burgheid or ''The Broch'', gd, Am Broch) is a small town in Moray, Scotland, about north-west of Elgin. The town is mainly built on a peninsula that projects north-westward into the Moray Firth, surrounding it by water on t ...

on the same frequency (until 1989 200 kHz, now 198 kHz). This mast is of guyed steel lattice construction with triangular cross-section and it carries a 'capacity hat', which increases the antenna's efficiency, at the top. The site is owned and operated by

Arqiva Arqiva () is a British telecommunications company which provides infrastructure, broadcast transmission and smart meter facilities in the United Kingdom. The company is headquartered at the former Independent Broadcasting Authority headquart ...

Transmissions

A number of items in the BBC Radio 4 schedule are carried on the longwave frequency only: these include Yesterday in Parliament at 0835–0900 on Tuesdays to Fridays,

The Daily Service ''The Daily Service'' is a short Christian service broadcast every weekday morning between 09:45 and 10:00 on BBC Radio 4's long wave and DAB frequencies. It was also broadcast on Radio 4's FM frequencies until 13 September 1991. In 1926, Britis ...

at 0945–1000 on Mondays to Fridays, the

Shipping Forecast The Shipping Forecast is a BBC Radio broadcast of weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the coasts of the British Isles. It is produced by the Met Office and broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. ...

at 1201–1204 daily and 1754–1757 on Mondays to Fridays, and ''

Test Match Special ''Test Match Special'' (also known as ''TMS'') is a British sports radio programme, originally, as its name implies, dealing exclusively with Test cricket matches, but currently covering any professional cricket. It broadcasts on BBC Radio 4 LW ...

'' during international cricket games. A number of programmes on

BBC Radio Scotland BBC Radio Scotland is a Scotland, Scottish radio station, radio network owned and operated by BBC Scotland, a division of the BBC. It broadcasts a wide variety of programmes. It replaced the Scottish BBC Radio 4 opt-out service of the same na ...

are different on Medium wave compared to the FM schedule as well. The medium wave broadcast is strong enough to be heard as far south as the West Midlands at certain times of the day.

Services available

References

External links

Westerglen at The Transmission Gallery
* http://www.wabweb.net/radio/radio/lw2.htm#Droitwich * * {{Cite web, title=Drawings of Westerglen AM Transmitter - SkyscraperPage.com, url=https://skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?buildingID=40707, access-date=2021-10-17, website=skyscraperpage.com
Map of site
Radio in the United Kingdom Transmitter sites in Scotland

Transmissions

Services available

See also

References

External links