INTRODUCTION
Once you have spent time DX'ing on the Broadcast Bands both AM and FM, you
will notice that there is a difference between the Canadian and American radio stations.
These differences may be subtle and some may be more noticeable. In this article, I will
attempt to outline these differences in an effort to help you out in ID'ing some of the
stations up here in the GREAT WHITE NORTH.
ID'S WE DON'T NEED ANY ID'S
Yes, up here some stations particularly those stations on FM may never give what you would
call a legal ID, as the American stations have to once each hour. Canadian stations as far
as I can figure must give their legal call sign once a day not once an hour. This can lead to
stations using only their slogans as an ID. This may be catchy and keep the listeners' attention
but it does nothing for a DX'er. If you are looking for a legal ID containing call sign,
frequency and location you may have a long wait with some Canadian stations. A slogan may have
to do for many stations here in Canada. To help you ID many of the stations that have fallen
into the habit of using only a slogan or slogans, I recommend that you make good use of the Slogans
List found elsewhere in the NRC AM LOG.
CALL SIGNS
Yes even if they do not have to use them all the time all stations do have a call sign. All of
the stations in Canada will have a call sign that starts with a "C." Well, almost all
of them. In the province of Newfoundland and Labrador they still use CALL SIGNS that start with
"VO". These stations were allowed to keep their old CALL SIGNS when Newfoundland and
Labrador joined Canada as a province in 1949. There are fewer and fewer of these "VO" calls
and they easily stick out if you hear one. However any station in Newfoundland and Labrador that
wishes to obtain a new call sign or apply for a new station must take a call sign starting with a
"C" as is the case for the rest of Canada.
In fact the stations not only start with a "C" but due to international allocations all
AM and FM stations in Canada will start with "CB", "CF", "CH", "CI",
"CJ", and "CK"only. You will also find that some relay stations will have the
same call sign as their main station but will have a number after the call sign to distinguish them
from one another. This is particularly true of the CBC relay stations. As an example here in Manitoba,
we have CKSB on 1050 in Winnipeg with one of its many relays, CKSB-2 on 860 in Ste. Lazare. This
is a definite difference between US and Canadian stations on the AM and FM bands. As well many relay
stations that run under 100 watts start VF then 4 numbers. These will not ID separately but will use
the callsign of the originating station.
Almost all of the CBC or Canadian Broadcasting Corporation stations start with the two letters "CB."
This is another oddity of Canadian radio. If you look in the internationally allocated CALL SIGNS
you will see that the entire "CB" call sign block is allocated to Chile in South America
and not Canada. This means that technically most CBC stations are using illegal CALL SIGNS. However
there is an out for the CBC as the international agreement states that stations can call themselves
what they want. The good old CBC has decided to "borrow" these CALL SIGNS.
The TIS stations in Canada also use these "CB" calls and add a "P" after
the "CB." This is done as the TIS stations are licensed to the CBC here in Canada as part
of the service to the public. Almost all save for two stations that are TIS stations use the "CBP-"
call sign system. Also if you look through the TIS listingsthat most Canadian TIS's
are not located on 530 or 1610 KHZ, but are located throughout the AM band. There is a movement to the FM band where most of the new
applications for TIS are being made.
On FM you will find many stations that have an unusual call sign. These are very low powered relay
stations that serve isolated communities. These relays will have a call sign that starts with a "VF"
then four numbers between 2000 and 7000. It is extremely unlikely you will ever hear the call sign used as these
are relays under 100 watts, and for the most part under 50 watts. The main station will use its CALL
SIGNS not those of the relay station or stations if and when they ID. If you are lucky enough to
hear one of these low powered relays you have a great catch.
As you can figure out any other station you will hear will start with a "C" and have two
or three call letters after it. The trick of course is to hear the call sign at all. As many stations
in Canada broadcast in French as well as in English, I will supply you with a listing of how the letter
would sound phonetically if you were to hear them on the air. As with the Spanish stations in the USA
these stations will ID in French, however unlike the USA Spanish stations, these stations will not
ID in English on the hour. In fact many of the CBC French service or SRC (Societe Radio-Canada) stations
as they are called in French will ID only as RADIO CANADA or SRC. Keep your ears open and listen
carefully to the station and you will hear a call sign or slogan that you can use to ID the station.
FRENCH IN CANADA
Do not forget that there are stations broadcasting in French that are private as well as the SRC
(Societe Radio-Canada) stations. They have a wide variety of music and programming. As a rule if
the station is broadcasting in French and it is outside of Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick you
can almost bet on it being part of the SRC system. Check for parallels, as many stations broadcast
the same programming across the country. There are also more and more ethnic stations springing up
across the country so be careful that the station you are listening to is in French and not some
other language that is being used by the station. These ethnic stations so far are in major centres
across the country such a Winnipeg, Toronto, and Vancouver as an example.
NEWS WEATHER AND SPORTS
Well here is an area you can really use to tell if you are listening to a Canadian station. Our news,
weather and sports will sound different from USA stations. This is particularly true of the weather
and sports reports.
I will attempt to show you some of the major differences to help you separate Canadian from American
radio stations if all you catch is a news, weather, or sports report.
I will deal with each type of broadcast separately to give you some of the finer points of each. Some
of this information is fairly common knowledge, but some will be new.
NEWS REPORTS
As you could guess the first thing you will notice is we talk a lot more
about Canada and less about the USA.
You will hear news about such things as:
Parliament and not Congress
House of Commons not the House of Representatives
Senate and ...(hey we have one too!)
The Prime Minister not the President
Premier of a province not a state Governor
MP's are Members of Parliament not Congressmen
MLA's are Members of the Legislative Assembly not state representatives of various descriptions
The President of the United States not just the President, as there is more than one President
Provincial news and not State news
SPORTS REPORTS
Yes we do play hockey but not quite all year. We do give out sports reports on all kinds of different
sports including hockey, football, baseball etc., but once again this will have a Canadian slant to it.
Some differences will be:
Football will talk about the CFL or Canadian Football League before the NFL scores
Hockey is big in the fall, winter and spring so watch for NHL and other hockey league scores
Baseball will probably start with information on the Toronto Blue Jays
Basketball - Toronto gets top billing in scores
Curling is big in the winter and early spring so watch for "bonspiel" results
Not a lot of attention is given to College or University sports except championship games
There is some coverage of local sports but almost no broadcasts of High School games
WEATHER REPORTS
No, it will not be colder all the time. In fact, where I live in Winnipeg, MB, the worst storms
we get, seem to come from the Dakotas. You can keep your storms, we have our own! You will notice
some very basic differences, however, in the way ENVIRONMENT CANADA reports the weather. EnviroCan
is our version of NOAA and is the main source of weather reports and forecasts although some stations
use Accu-Weather.
Now for those weather differences:
Temperatures will be in Celsius and not Fahrenheit so it will sound colder than it really is
Wind speed is in Kilometres per hour or KPH so it sounds windier than it is
Barometric pressure is in Kilopascals not inches
Precipitation is measured in Millimetres and Centimetres not inches, so it may sound very wet
Mention of "Canadian Cold Fronts" will mean you have an American not Canadian station
Cold fronts in the winter are called Arctic Flows
Of these news weather and sports reports, the weather reports are the biggest tip off that you have
a Canadian station as the news and sports can be similar depending on world events. Local broadcasts
are always a big help because of the information they contain. Large stations, the CBC/SRC stations
in particular, will give the weather not only for their city, but for a large region or on occasion
the entire province. Be careful if there are stations that may overlap in coverage or national forecasts
that are general in nature.
TIME
Canada has the privilege of having numerous time zones to contend with. As with the USA there are the
four basic time zones:
Eastern Time
Central Time
Mountain Time
Pacific Time
However as the country stretches further to the East and to the West than does the continental United
States we have added two time zones. These time zones are:
Atlantic Time
Newfoundland Time
The Atlantic Time covers the Provinces of New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and Labrador.
This time zone is one hour ahead of Eastern time. Finally we come to Newfoundland. As you will remember
Newfoundland was the only province in Canada that had stations whose CALL SIGNS did not start with "C".
Well another condition of joining Canada way back in 1949 was that Newfoundland could keep its unique time zone.
Newfoundland is situated in an area where it is between the Atlantic Time Zone and the next one over. To keep
time correctly Newfoundlanders set their clocks one half hour ahead of Atlantic Time.
This half hour is still enforced to this day so Newfoundland Time is one and a half hour ahead of
Eastern Time.
You will notice this when you hear a station from Newfoundland or when you are listening to a national
network, the CBC in particular. you will hear announcements like:
Listen to a program at nine o'clock, nine thirty in Newfoundland
Time is one o'clock, one thirty in Newfoundland
We will be live at two o'clock, a half hour later in Newfoundland
Well, you get the idea about this most unique of all North American time zones. There is an old joke about
the soothsayer who walked through the Eastern part of Canada carrying a sign saying:
THE WORLD WILL END AT 2:00, 2:30 IN NEWFOUNDLAND!
LANGUAGE
As previously mentioned there are two main languages heard in Canada, English and French. We do have some
ethnic stations that will broadcast in several languages each day. However it is the English stations I
will be dealing with here. Our English is about the same as you would find in the USA but we do have some
differences you may notice. First off we do say ZED and not ZEE for the last letter of the alphabet. This
helps in partial ID's you may get. We also tend to say EH a lot of the time, as in "How's it going, eh?".
Canadians will also pronounce the "A" at the end of a word as an "A" and not "ER"
as Americans tend to. It is NOT Warshington DC for your nation's capital nor do we live in Canader. Also,
you will notice that the top of a Canadian building has a "roof" not a"ruff" and we play
"rock" not"rack" music on our stations. In fact these tricks are used at the Canada-US
border to separate the Canucks from the Yanks. It is said that we sound more British up here and that
is because many of the teachers in the 30's, 40's, 50's and 60's were of British decent, so listen closely
and you will hear the difference.
In an effort to insure that there is a consistent pronunciation on the CBC the network has a pronunciation
guide that all announcers are asked to follow. This may seem a bit much to some people but it does lead to
news,weather and sports reports that are uniform and no matter what station you are listening to you know
what the information is about and who is being reported on.
THE CBC AND SRC RADIO NETWORKS
These networks can be heard all across the country due to a series of large powered stations and a network of
LPRT's (Low Powered Relay Transmitters), blanketing the nation. You would have to be in a very remote
corner of the country not to be able to receive the CBC. The Radio 1 Network is made up of national and local or
regional programming.
The local or regional programs are aired only at specific times:
From local 05:30 until 09:00 daily
Again at noon from 12:00 to 14:00 Monday to Friday
Finally at 16:00 to 18:00 again only Monday to Friday
Local or regional weather reports will follow major newscasts on most stations
Local or regional news may follow the national news at 22:00
All time above are local time and are true for the CBC AM radio network
Times other than those above will have national programming. This is a valuable aid to DX'ers because if you
can find another CBC station in the same time zone you should find them parallel to each other. One other
small quirk you may find to do with the CBC is that the relay stations may carry the CBC Stereo Radio 2 network
programs. The CBC Stereo Radio 2 network is the FM side of the network and at night is mainly music programming.
This Stereo or the Radio 2 Network is on 24 hours a day. It carries some of the programs carried on the AM
network, but at different times and or days. The CBC Stereo network also has much of its own programming.
The news and weather is often shared by both networks
The relay of CBC Stereo at night is a thing of the past as the CBC main s
tations are no longer signing off at 01:15 local time.
The CBC is relaying various International Shortwave stations such as Radio Australia, Radio France
International and Radio Nederlands. So if you hear shortwave on your AM band don't get too worried;
you may have a CBC station between 01:00 and 05:30 local times.
One final quirk about the CBC is that it may eliminate local programming completely on holidays. In an
effort to save some money and give Canadians quality programming on holidays such as Easter, Christmas,
Labour Day etc., the CBC will run a national service all day. This will mean that the local news and
weather will be almost nonexistent but boy do you get a great cross country weather report near the hour!
It is these days that DX'ers may find parallels much easier to find as most stations will have similar
programming all day, especially within the same time zone.
The CBC French network or SRC also has local programming. As these stations are 24 hours and do not sign
off, as do the English CBC stations, the local programming is different. Most stations have local
programming from 05:30 or 06:00 until 17:30 or 18:00 weekdays. Weekends seem to be more network oriented
all day.
After midnight until around 06:00 daily there is classical music on all stations and as they join up after
their local midnight. This uniformity makes finding parallels easy to find even across time zones.
The CBC and SRC both carry no commercials on their networks. It has only been in the last few years that
they have been carrying political advertisements, and this was only after a lengthy court battle. These
paid advertisements are for federal elections only. All revenues are raised via taxes. This may end soon
as the public is looking to cut taxes and the CBC and SRC are areas that may be affected. For now though
all CBC and SRC stations are commercial free and the heads of these networks are working hard to keep it
that way.
As a point of interest you might like to know how much it costs to run the three CBC/SRC networks. The
latest figures I could find are for the year ending March 31,1994. The cost was $324,800,000.00
Yes, that is a lot of tax dollars to be put out to keep these stations on the air and to fulfil the mandate
the government has set out. Remember this is commercial free radio without fund raising drives as there is
with Public Radio in the USA.
PRIVATE NETWORKS
There are other networks in Canada besides the CBC and SRC. These private networks will fall into two areas.
The first area is news networks that you for the most part will only hear on the hour with you guessed it,
the news. The news main networks are:
Broadcast News
CHUM News Network
NTR or the Broadcast News French Network
CTV News Network
TELEBEC Network
Radiomutuel in French
Satellite Radio Network
Telemedia Ontario in English
Telemedia Quebec on FM only in French
Radiomedia on AM only in French
CHUM Radio Network
Access Network in Alberta only
VOCM radio Newfoundland Ltd
One thing you will notice about Canadian stations is there seem to be other networks other than
those mentioned above. These exist mainly in Alberta ,British Columbia and Ontario, as well as
Quebec. They do operate as small regional networks but many are relay stations used to cover
areas such as mountainous regions in British Columbia. Most of these stations are 1000 watts or
less with many under 100 watts.
Many of these relay systems are parallels but you will not find simulcasts as in the USA. These are
separate stations serving different areas not an AM and FM serving the same area. Simulcasting is
virtually unknown in Canada unless a station is moving from AM to FM. Then for a short pre-
determined time a station will simulcast to encourage listeners to move to the new frequency. This
will usually go on for two to four weeks except in the rare case when a station is the only station
in the area and then a few months of simulcasting may occur if approved by the CRTC when the new
licence is issued.
Look upon these stations as twins each helping listeners hear their favourite station under difficult
geographical conditions. This is big country and these relay networks help people in more remote areas
receive the quality programming big city dwellers are used to receiving.
REGULATION OF STATIONS
In Canada we have not one but two regulatory bodies, the CRTC (Canadian Radio, Television, and
Telecommunications Commission) and Industry Canada. Industry Canada has taken over the section of
government formerly called the D.O.C. (Department of Communications). The CRTC is the body that
grants licences to all Radio, Television, and Cable companies as well as other telecommunications
companies such as telephone companies. The CRTC grants the licenses and sets out the rules by
which all stations will operate such as format, content, hours of operation, etc. The people at
Industry Canada are the folks that handle CALL SIGNS and look after the technical side of how
the stations operate. In the USA the FCC handles all of these duties.
Another thing to remember is that a station when it goes to renew a license must prove that it
has and will continue to live up to the clauses in its license as to content and format. A change
in format on FM must be legally applied for by the station. A hearing is held where the public
and other radio stations or interested groups can express their opinions. A change in the way a
station operates can be a lengthy process due to these hearings. As an example a station
application was put forward here in Winnipeg several years ago and when the hearings were held
almost all of the present local stations made presentations to the CRTC. After considering all
of the evidence from the hearing the application was denied. This long complicated and expensive
process insures a variety of formats for a city or area of the country as well as a lack of
stations as compared to the USA. Canada is more like Europe than its neighbour to the South as
far as licensing radio stations go.
There is, however, a push on to de-regulate the radio license process it make it more free enterprise
oriented.
Also with all of the tax money spent on CBC and SRC stations there is a movement to privatize these
stations to help cut back on taxes. However in order to raise more money for the CBC and SRC,
supporters are calling for more money to be raised through new and inventive methods. They have gone
as far as to suggest a tax on radios, televisions ,VCR's and VCR tapes and rentals to raise money
for the CBC and SRC. This will be a long struggle for both sides.
THE FUTURE
As you can see we up here in the Great White North are different than American stations in many ways.
These are volatile times and the next few years leading up to the year 2000 will be interesting for
all concerned. Changes in technology from AM stereo to satellite fed music systems will change and
mould the Canadian radio scene as never before. All Canadians, the public, owners and regulators
will have to look forward in order to keep radio a vibrant information and entertainment service.
There is currently a shift from AM to FM going on in Canada and I cannot see this tide changing
except in cities where all frequencies have allocated on FM and stations are "stuck" on
AM. DX'ers on both sides of the longest undefended border in the world will be affected by these
trends, but one thing is for sure it will not be boring.
CONCLUSION
I hope that this information has been of use to you and that in some small way it has helped to
understand how Canadian stations are different than our cousins to the South. It is more than
language or weather it is a system and a set of traditions that go back to the earliest days of
radio.
Over the years the public, the owners and the government have moulded the way Canadian radio
stations operate and the way they sound. It is what makes Canadian stations unique and we love it.
So Good Luck and Bon Chance with your DX'ing the AM and FM radio stations in the Great White
North. Oh, yes...Have A Good Day, eh!!!
E-MAIL AMANDX
