Paul Golder writes for the Brentwood Gazette

Phoenix FM is aiming to get out to a much bigger radio audience next year – and also kick start the growth of community radio between here and the east end of London.

We’ve just teamed up with Basildon community station Gateway 97.8 to form a new not-for-profit organisation – East London and Essex Digital.

The aim is to win the licence to operate a DAB multiplex which will cover Brentwood, Basildon, Havering, Redbridge and Newham. Ofcom have been advertising these new small-scale licences, and we put in our application just before last week’s closing date.

DAB isn’t a new thing, but it is a rich man (or rich station’s) toy. There are very few companies operating multiplexes – a digital transmitter which can broadcast up to 24 stations at once – and we were quoted a very large five figure sum last time we enquired to get onto DAB.

Ofcom have seen this lack of competition as a problem, and have been advertising new small scale licences for community operators to control – which massively drives down costs.

There will be other groups bidding for the licences – but ours is the only one to be backed by every Ofcom-licensed community station in our area. We’ve already confirmed transmitter sites in Brentwood, Romford and Ilford to carry all the new signals.

Our proposals to Ofcom confirm that over 1,200,000 listeners will be able to receive Phoenix FM on DAB+ comfortably in their homes, with many more picking us up in their cars further afield.

If we’re successful we’ll be carrying at least seven community radio stations at low cost and we expect new ventures to appear in Romford and Ilford. We’ve already spoken to a prospective new community station in Romford.

We should find out early next year if we’re successful, and if we are, we’ll be talking to more prospective local operators to see if we can establish more local stations in our area.

Photo: local antenna specialists Foxtel hard at work putting up our FM aerial at a new site in Brentwood in 2017.