BBC Radio Berkshire

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BBC Radio Berkshire is the BBC Local Radio service for the English county of Berkshire. It broadcasts on 94.6 (Henley), 95.4 (Windsor), 104.1 (Hannington, north Hampshire) and 104.4 (Broad St Mall, Reading) FM from its studios at Caversham Park near Reading. The 104.1 FM signal is the strongest by far.

Contents

1 History
2 Transmitters
3 Current schedule
4 Weather
5 External links

History

The station began on 26 January 1991, starting as a sister station of Radio Oxford, broadcasting for part of the weekday and weekend mornings, before joining BBC World Service programming. Due to financial cutbacks, BBC Director-General John Birt annoounced that it was to merge with BBC Radio Oxford on 9 April 1996 to become BBC Thames Valley FM and featured Martin Kelner, who now broadcasts irreverently on Radio Leeds. Separate breakfast shows for Reading and Oxford began. On 13 February 2000, the two stations became separate once again, although shared several programmes until September 2003.

Transmitters

The Hannington transmitter, on Cottington Hill (close to Watership Down) also carries television channels and 2-Ten FM on 102.9FM. The 104.1FM signal can be heard over most of Hampshire, certainly more than Radio Solent. The Broad St Mall transmitter carries 2-Ten FM on 97FM, and Radio Berkshire since 1991, although the BBC call it Fountain House, the name of the building it is fixed to. Henley broadcasts 2-Ten FM on 103.4FM.

The station essentially covers the M4 corridor.

Current schedule

Maggie Philbin is the breakfast show co-presenter, often out and about in the BBC Radio Berkshire radio car. Portsmouth University-educated Jim Cathcart provides an early-morning show from 5am and Henry Kelly now presents the mid-morning show every Monday - Friday from 10am-1pm.

The station is quite Reading-centric, and covers much sporting action from Reading FC at the Madejski Stadium, also known as the 'Mad Stad'. Presenters Joel Hufford and Tim Dellor provide commentary on all Royal's matches throughout the season.

In the evening, after 7pm, all BBC radio stations in the South and South-East join up. The evening show used to be presented by Belfast-accented Sue Dougan, but now it's Charlie Crocker, and comes from Tunbridge Wells, home of Radio Kent.

Newsreaders on Radio Bristol have been known to pronounce Berkshire phonetically as Birkshire.

Weather

During the morning there are several regular presenters which do the weather forecasts for BBC Radio Berkshire Breakfast programme. They are:

[Sean Batty]

[Liam Dutton]

Kaye Forster

Laura Gilchrist

Helen McKenzie

External links

BBC Local Radio stations
BBC Radio Berkshire	BBC Radio Bristol	BBC Radio Cambridgeshire
BBC Radio Cleveland	BBC Radio Cornwall	BBC Coventry & Warwickshire
BBC Radio Cumbria	BBC Radio Derby	BBC Radio Devon
BBC Essex	BBC Radio Gloucestershire	BBC Radio Manchester
BBC Radio Guernsey	BBC Hereford and Worcester	BBC Radio Humberside
BBC Radio Jersey	BBC Radio Kent	BBC Radio Lancashire
BBC Radio Leeds	BBC Radio Leicester	BBC Radio Lincolnshire
BBC London 94.9	BBC Radio Merseyside	BBC Radio Newcastle
BBC Radio Norfolk	BBC Radio Northampton	BBC Radio Nottingham
BBC Radio Oxford	BBC Radio Sheffield	BBC Radio Shropshire
BBC Radio Solent	BBC Somerset Sound	BBC Southern Counties Radio
BBC Radio Stoke	BBC Radio Suffolk	BBC Radio Swindon
BBC Three Counties Radio	BBC WM	BBC Radio Wiltshire
BBC Radio York

Former BBC Local Radio stations
BBC Radio Brighton	BBC Radio Bedfordshire	BBC Radio Durham
BBC GLR	BBC GMR	BBC Radio London

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