Ohio HD Radio Observations

On a recent trip to Ohio near Canton, I was checking out the sounds I could pull in on my HD Radio I installed in my vehicle for such trips. I was somewhat surprised by how many Cleveland area HD signals I could pull in since I was about an hour or so away from the Rock ‘N Roll City. Despite the very low power output of HD stations, I was able to listen to some very good HD2 channels like country outlet WGAR 99.5 HD2, where they put out a classic country signal. Another was Oldies WMJI “Majic 105.7” with their HD2 channel playing 50’s & 60’s oldies while the main signal plays more 60’s – 80’s. Kudos to them for giving listeners an option. Speaking of which is WNWV “107.3 The Wave”, which is a very successful smooth jazz station. Their HD2 option is traditional jazz. For those who like their AM to sound like FM, I was also able to check out WTAM 1100. I wouldn’t call the sound FM, but it’s pretty close. While I definitely wouldn’t recommend Nighttime HD for AM because of the HD signal dropouts due to various interference issues, daytime AM HD isn’t too shabby. While those were very good, there were some that were not so good. A couple I found included WHOF 101.7 in Canton and WKDD 98.1 from Akron. Both stations had HD2 signals but both were silent. This is definitely not a good way to promote multiple streams of audio when there is no audio. Someone at the respective stations needs to monitor the signals & not simply assume that they are on. Let’s hope that a proposed power spike for HD Radio takes place and increases coverage areas to the point where you are not losing HD2 or HD3 signals when driving.