About TEN-FM Stanthorpe

TEN-FM Stanthorpe

TEN-FM is a community radio station serving Stanthorpe and the Granite Belt in Queensland, Australia on 98.7 MHz FM — the Queensland repeater of the Tenterfield-based community station that has broadcast since 1983. The station transmits on 89.7 MHz with a 4 kW transmitter on Mt Mackenzie, 8 km south-west of Tenterfield in New South Wales, and on 98.7 MHz with a 100-watt transmitter on Mt Marlay, one kilometre east of the Stanthorpe CBD. Run by two incorporated associations — the Tenterfield & District Community FM Radio Assoc Inc and the Stanthorpe & Granite Belt Community Radio Assoc Inc — it reaches more than 18,000 listeners across an area of over 10,000 square kilometres. Its website is https://tenfm.org.au/, with studios in Tenterfield and a second studio at the Stanthorpe Civic Centre, 61 Marsh Street, Stanthorpe. Published contacts: office (02) 6736 3444, Stanthorpe on-air studio (07) 4681 0031, info@tenfm.org.au.

Overview

TEN-FM is the border community's station: "Your feel great community station," broadcasting across the New South Wales–Queensland border to Tenterfield, Stanthorpe, Texas and the dozens of small towns between them. It claims possibly one of the largest broadcasting areas of any community station in Australia — and the claim is credible: the 4 kW Mt Mackenzie signal and the Stanthorpe repeater cover the granite country on both sides of the border, from Glen Innes to Wallangarra, Drake to Thulimbah. The Stanthorpe operation — the 98.7 repeater on Mt Marlay and the second studio at the Stanthorpe Civic Centre — makes the Queensland side a full partner, not an afterthought.

History

Tenterfield itself is the station's spiritual home: the historic NSW town — the Tenterfield Saddler, the Federation speech — just south of the border, the natural centre for the border communities. The Mt Mackenzie transmitter, 8 km south-west of town, puts the 4 kW signal over the granite highlands: the elevation doing the work, the 89.7 frequency carrying across the border into Queensland. The caravan on the mountaintop was the high point in every sense.

TEN-FM originally started transmitting in 1983 from a caravan on the top of Mount Mackenzie — the classic community-radio origin: a caravan, a transmitter, and a town that wanted its own voice. The station was opened in the early 1980s as 2TEN FM; the "2" was later dropped because of the extended service area into Queensland, making it TEN FM — the border station, neither wholly NSW nor wholly Queensland.

The station is now located in Tenterfield, just south of the NSW/QLD border, with the second studio in Stanthorpe. It is run as two separately incorporated organisations: the Tenterfield & District Community FM Radio Assoc Inc (ABN 72 288 279 866) and the Stanthorpe & Granite Belt Community Radio Assoc Inc (ABN 26 985 287 576) — the two communities, two associations, one station.

In April 2016, more than $5,000 of funding was awarded to TEN-FM after the station applied for a government grant — expected to be used for air-conditioning installation and computer protection software. In July 2016, the Member for Lismore announced a further $5,000 grant for an additional relay tower at Drake, enabling more reliable coverage for the Drake area. The grants are the small change of community radio — but they keep the caravan's descendant on the air.

Stanthorpe — the Queensland home — is the Granite Belt's capital: the apples, the wineries, the cold-climate country, the town that gets snow. The 98.7 repeater on Mt Marlay — 100 watts, about 10 km of coverage — is the Granite Belt's own frequency: the orchardists, the winemakers, the tourists on the food-and-wine trail. The Stanthorpe Civic Centre studio — 61 Marsh Street, in the town's civic heart — gives them a physical presence: the Queensland studio, for the Queensland audience.

Programming

TEN-FM's programming is the community mix: the Variety Breakfast Show, the Home Run Requests, Talking NRL, Top of the Pops, the Global Dance Session, the Rick Dees Weekly Top 40 Countdown, and the "massive More Music Variety playlist." The station provides vital information to the local community as well as entertainment — the bushfire warnings, the road closures, the community notices that the border towns depend on. The Stanthorpe studio — (07) 4681 0031 — gives the Queensland side its own on-air presence: the Granite Belt's voices on the Granite Belt's frequency.

The station's signal is RDS-compatible — the digital song-title and show-name data riding alongside the audio — a touch of modernity for a station that started in a caravan.

Texas — the Queensland town on the coverage list — is the border's western outpost: the cattle town on the Dumaresq, named for the Texas cattle station, not the American state. That TEN-FM's signal reaches it — across the granite country from Mt Mackenzie — shows the scale of the coverage: the border towns, the farming districts, the places the metropolitan stations never think about. The 70-plus localities on the station's list are the audience: small, scattered, and loyal.

Coverage & Audience

TEN-FM transmits on 89.7 MHz from Mt Mackenzie (4 kW, 8 km south-west of Tenterfield) and on 98.7 MHz from Mt Marlay (100 watts, 1 km east of the Stanthorpe CBD, serving about 10 km around Stanthorpe). The coverage list reads like a gazetteer of the border country: in NSW — Tenterfield, Jennings, Legume, Yetman, Urbenville, Glen Innes, Tabulam, Woodenbong, Bonshaw, Drake, Deepwater; in Queensland — Texas, Stanthorpe, Ballandean, Wallangarra. The station's own site lists more than 70 localities, from Acacia Creek to Yetman.

The audience: more than 18,000 listeners in an area of over 10,000 square kilometres — and, via the stream at tenfm.org.au and the Community Radio Plus app, a global audience of former residents, travellers and the merely curious. For sponsors, the pitch is the reach: not just the transmission area, but everyone with an interest in the area, anywhere in the world.

The two-association structure is the border solution: the Tenterfield & District association for the NSW side, the Stanthorpe & Granite Belt association for the Queensland side — each incorporated, each with its ABN, each representing its community. The '2' dropped from 2TEN FM was the symbolic version of the same: the station refusing to be just a NSW station when half its audience was in Queensland. TEN-FM belongs to the border — both sides of it.

Ownership

TEN-FM is a community-licensed, not-for-profit broadcaster, run as two separately incorporated organisations: the Tenterfield & District Community FM Radio Assoc Inc and the Stanthorpe & Granite Belt Community Radio Assoc Inc. It is volunteer-powered, with studios in Tenterfield and at the Stanthorpe Civic Centre, 61 Marsh Street, Stanthorpe. Published contacts: office (02) 6736 3444, Stanthorpe on-air studio (07) 4681 0031, info@tenfm.org.au.

The broadcast equipment list — StationPlaylist Pro for automation, Adobe Audition and Studio One for production, the Elan mixer, the Lenovo on-air computer, the Marantz and Denon CD players, the Bowers & Wilkins monitors — is the modern community station: professional tools, volunteer hands. The caravan on Mount Mackenzie had none of this; the Tenterfield studios have all of it. The technology changed; the volunteers didn't.

Digital Presence

The station's website is https://tenfm.org.au/, with streaming via the site and the Community Radio Plus mobile app, and a Facebook presence at facebook.com/tenfm. From the caravan on Mount Mackenzie in 1983 to the RDS-compatible signal of today: TEN-FM, your feel-great community station — 89.7 in Tenterfield, 98.7 in Stanthorpe, and worldwide on the stream at tenfm.org.au — from 2TEN FM to TEN-FM, from the caravan to the Civic Centre.