francisco bay area branding radio zindagi slogan jiye ja frequency 1550 khz repeater s kmvq hd3 first air date 1947 format indian talk music power 10 000 watts class b facility id 25458 callsign meaning radio zindagi former callsigns kfrc 2009 2011 kycy 1997 2009 kpix 1994 1997 kkhi 1963 1994 kqby 1960 1963 koby 1956 1960 kear 1952 1956 ksmo 1947 1952 owner cbs radio operated by cinemaya media under a time brokerage agreement cbs radio east inc. sister stations kcbs kfrc fm kits kllc kmvq fm also part of cbs corp. cluster kpix tv and kbcw webcast listen live website www.radiozindagi.com kzdg 1550 am ; radio zindagi is a radio station in san francisco owned by cbs radio and programmed by cinemaya media . kzdg features talk and music programming targeted to the bay area s indian population . 1 contents 1 format 2 history 2.1 ksmo 2.2 koby 2.3 kkhi 2.4 kpix 2.5 kycy 2.6 kfrc 2.7 kzdg 2.8 transmitter site 3 references 4 external links format edit main article radio zindagi radio zindagi started in 2011 on kzdg as a successful south asian radio format with concentration in bollywood and indian american affairs . the format has spread to the new york city and washington d.c. areas and is also a syndicated format . history edit ksmo edit the 1550am frequency has been home to many call signs and formats since it signed on in 1947 . the original format was classical music as ksmo later kear . koby edit when the station was sold in 1956 following a brief period of being off the air it flipped to top 40 as koby . the station quickly went to the top of the local ratings . they also simulcast with their new fm station at 95.7 . soon other stations in the bay area switched to top 40 and with much deeper financial resources and the owners of koby decided to sell . in order to inflate station revenues they began programming heavy amounts of commercials . this move backfired and potential buyers were scared away from the rapidly failing stations . in 1960 koby and koby fm switched to beautiful music under a new owner with new call letters kqby . ratings were still poor and the owner ran out of money . the stations went dark once again until a new buyer was found . kkhi edit the new owner adopted a middle of the road mor format for the two stations with the call letters kkhi as well as personality oriented disc jockeys . the next year kkhi fm due to new federal communications commission fcc regulations concerning fm simulcasting switched to an automated beautiful music format . soon after the owner ran out of money and with a severe cutback of station staffers including the expensive disc jockeys flipped to classical music once again . eventually they simulcast once again with their fm signal . the classical format was somewhat successful but the owner could not dig himself out of his massive debts and sold the stations in 1965 . the new owners buckley broadcasting were satisfied with the revenue generated by kkhi so the format was kept . buckley continued to own the station and program classical music until 1994 . kpix edit group w the owners of kpix tv purchased the two stations in may 1994 and switched to all news with the kpix call letters . the stations did not do well in the ratings due to heavy competition with the long established kcbs and kgo . however kpix was notable for its continuous coverage of the o.j. simpson murder case . when the trial ended kpix resumed its all news format with ratings still falling . cbs and westinghouse merged operations in 1995 and to comply with fcc ownership regulations kpix fm was sold to bonneville . on may 30 1997 after kpix fm was sold to bonneville and flipped to top 40 chr kpix am dropped the news programming and began simulcasting new sister station kycy and its then country music format as well as adopting the kycy am call letters . 2 kycy edit the two stations simulcasted until september 13 1999 when the am station switched to a talk format as yada yada radio 1550 consisting of syndicated shows from hosts don imus g. gordon liddy tom leykis jim bohannon opie & anthony larry king bruce williams and america in the morning . 3 4 the talk format performed poorly and rarely appeared in the arbitron ratings books . on may 16 2005 kycy adopted a unique format that has never been tried on terrestrial radio before an all podcast format branded as kyou radio . kycy logo kyouradio was the first radio station to have output that is 100 % based on podcasts or user generated content . announcing the change of format cbs radio chief executive joel hollander described the new format as something of an experiment . the first program was from podcast veteran dave winer . all content was submitted by listeners and in the two weeks before launch the station attracted over 400 submissions and a month after launch it was broadcasting around 1 200 podcasts a week . all material was screened to ensure it conformed with us federal guidelines on decency . the station manager stephen page claimed that after six months he had over 2 000 people offering to create content for the station . these contributors were unpaid . around 20 % of the content was speech based with the rest based on music . from 2006 to 2008 kycy was the flagship station of the oakland athletics major league baseball team ; in 2008 it shared that distinction with kfrc fm . on may 17 2007 cbs broadcasting shut down 106.9 free fm kifr and transferred it back to an oldies format with call sign kfrc fm . they also announced the move of some of their programs to 1550 . one month later three of kifr s former programs debuted on kycy 5 with the all podcast format continuing outside of those shows . kfrc edit it was announced on december 22 2008 that starting on new year s day 2009 this station would be switching formats again this time to an oldies format courtesy of scott shannon s the true oldies channel programmed by abc radio . also a callsign change was filed to adopt the kfrc call letters which resided previously on the am band at am 610 now kear . 6 at the same time the station lost a s broadcast rights to ktrb a station that was imported from the san joaquin valley just two years earlier . kfrc ran american top 40 the 70s with casey kasem on sundays at 8am 11am pacific time . this was not cbs first association with the kfrc call letters ; the original kfrc was an affiliate of the cbs radio network from 1929 through 1936 and cbs acquired that station along with its fm simulcast as part of its 1997 acquisition of infinity broadcasting corporation . kzdg edit kfrc s oldies format ended on september 1 2011 when the station was taken over by cinemaya media under a time brokerage agreement and adopted its current format of indian targeted talk and bollywood music branded as radio zindagi . the founders of radio zindagi are praveen suggala neeraj dhar ajay bhutoria and rohit saini . transmitter site edit am radio 1550 khz transmitter site and antennas near us highway 101 in belmont the am 1550 khz transmitter site is in the belmont wetlands area adjacent to us highway 101 and is licensed to cbs radio east inc. 7 8 the power level is 10 kw and the antenna system is a 3 tower directional array with a tower height of 46.9 meters located at coordinates 37 31 59 n 122 16 31 w 37.533093 n 122.275347 w 37.533093 ; 122.275347 . 8 7 the antenna system uses an open wire 5 wire coaxial feedline system . 8 the three red tower lights were a common nighttime landmark since 1947 along highway 101 but the tower lights are no longer illuminated due to an fcc construction permit granted in 2014 in which the station filed a minor coordinate correction of the tower system which led to avoidance of costly regulatory lighting requirements due to proximity to the san carlos airport . 7 8 9 the transmitter site is surrounded by o neill slough which is part of the san francisco bay tidal estuary in a spartina cordgrass area and clapper rail habitat . 10 the site has a history of flooding during storms and in recent years it is annually flooded during extreme high tide known as king tide whenever the level of the san francisco bay reaches approximately 9 feet above mllw mean lower low water datum at the redwood city tide station . 7 11 references edit cbs owned 1550 am in san francisco switches to south asian radio zindagi . radio info.com . september 1 2011 . retrieved september 1 2011 . http www.americanradiohistory.com archive randr 1990s 1997 rr 1997 05 23.pdf http www.americanradiohistory.com archive randr 1990s 1999 rr 1999 09 17.pdf http www.americanradiohistory.com archive randr 1990s 1999 rr 1999 09 24.pdf fong torres ben 2008 01 27 . wake up shake ups . san francisco chronicle . cbs radio san francisco brings kfrc back in oldies form radio ink released december 24 2008 a b c d fred krock 2015 11 27 . john schneider s voices out of the fog html . california historical radio society bay area radio museum . a b c d federal communications commission 2015 11 27 . fcc am station license listing html . us government . federal communications commission 2014 01 15 . fcc am station construction permit coordinate change html . us government . state coastal conservancy 2008 06 05 . invasive spartina control plans for the san francisco estuary pdf . san francisco estuary invasive spartina project . national oceanic and atmospheric administration 2015 11 27 . redwood city tide station html . us government . external links edit official website fcc history cards for kzdg full history of 1550am in san francisco kycy am first station to convert to all podcast format san francisco chronicle april 28 2005 san francisco radio station going all podcasts podcasting news april 27 2005 podcasting killed the radio star wired.com april 27 2005 san francisco s kycy to broadcast podcasts silicon valley san jose business journal april 27 2005 query the fcc s am station database for kzdg radio locator information on kzdg query nielsen audio s am station database for kzdg v t e radio stations in the san francisco california market by am frequency 560 610 680 740 810 860 910 960 1010 1050 1100 1170 1190 1220 1260 1310 1370 1400 1430 1450 1500 1510 1550 1590 16103 1640 by fm frequency 87.72 87.9 88.1 88.1 88.5 89.1 89.3 89.3 89.3 89.3 89.3 89.5 89.7 89.9 90.1 90.3 90.5 90.5 90.7 91.1 91.5 91.7 92.3 92.7 93.3 93.7 94.1 94.5 94.9 95.3 95.7 96.1 96.5 97.3 97.7 98.1 98.5 98.9 99.7 100.3 100.7 101.3 102.1 102.9 103.3 103.7 104.5 104.9 105.3 105.7 106.1 106.5 106.9 107.3 107.7 noaa weather radio frequency 162.4 162.45 162.5 162.55 by callsign kalw kalx kbay kblx fm kbrg kcbs kcea kcrh kcsm kdia kdow kdx54 kdya kear kec49 kecg kest kezr kfax kffg kfjc kfog kfrc fm kgmz kgo khb49 kioi kiqi kisq kits kksf kkup kliv kllc klok klvs kmel kmky kmtg kmvq fm hd3 knbr knew koit kosc kosf kpdo kpfa kpfb kpoo kqed fm krbq krev krsa krty krzz ksan kscu ksfb ksfh ksfn ksfo ksjo ksjs ksjx ksol ksqq ksrh ktct ktrb kufx kvto kvvf kvvn kvvz kwmr kxsc kxzm kyld kzdg kzsf kzsu wwf64 radio sausalito 3 defunct kabl kabl fm