About a pretty pole

The tallest structure in Santa Barbara’s skyline is a 200-foot pole painted red and white. It stands in a city equipment yard, not far from the ocean and the city’s famous Wharf. You can see it in the photo above, with the Wharf behind it.

As landmarks go it’s not much, but I like its looks and its legacy.

On the looks side, I dig the simplicity of its structure and the red and white colors. On the legacy side, I’m a connoisseur of radio transmitters (see here) who digs the fact that this pole radiates the broadcast signals of three AM stations at once, which is a rare thing. Since Santa Barbara has only five AM stations, the majority of them are right here. Scanning up (what used to be) the dial, those are:

KZSB/1290, the all-local-news station affiliated with the Santa Barbara News-Press. Born as KACL in 1962.
KCLU/1340, the AM member of California Lutheran University‘s chain of popular public radio signals for the South and Central Coasts, the rest of which are on FM. Born as KIST in 1946.
KOSJ/1490, the call letters of which stand for Old School Jams. Like KCLU, it also radiates an FM signal from Gibraltar Peak, high on the mountainside above town. Born as KDB in 1926.

All three have changed call letters, ownership, formats and transmitter locations many times over the years. Near as I can tell, this was originally the 1490 site, and the other two arrived in the early 90s: first 1290 and then 1340.

I bring this up because I’m a little bit worried that we might lose this landmark. That’s because (says here) KCLU/1340 has a construction permit for a new transmitting system on the same spot that involves a tower or pole that’s a good bit shorter, and that KZSB/1290 has an application for the same. KOSJ/1490 hasn’t applied for a change—yet.

So… it could be that KOSJ hasn’t bothered with an application to triplex on the same radiator with the other two stations. Or it could be that the other two will use a separate radiator that’s shorter and runs up the sides of the existing pole. Or, um, something I haven’t guessed.

For example, could be what’s going on is that they want to shorten the pole because it’s a tiny bit bent. If you look closely at the photo above, you’ll see that it angles a bit to the left (east in this view) from a bend at the bottom the top white section. Could be the three owners have collectively decided that the best thing to do is either saw off the pole at the bend or to take the whole thing down and build a new shorter pole or tower.

So I’m hoping one or more of the engineers involved can let us know what the plan is. I do hope they’ll keep the whole pole; but I’ll understand if they can’t.