City Birmingham First air date 1 January 1995 | Broadcast area West Midlands | |
Slogan Birmingham's No.1 Hit Music Station Frequency FM: 102.2 MHz
RDS: CAPITAL_
DAB Format Contemporary hit radio / Urban contemporary | ||
Capital Birmingham is a local radio station owned and operated by Global Radio as part of the Capital radio network. It broadcasts to the West Midlands from studios at Brindleyplace in Birmingham City Centre. Capital Birmingham's transmitter is located at Metropolitan House on the A456. It is also available on DAB via the Birmingham, Coventry, and Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury and Telford multiplexes.
Contents
History
The station began broadcasting as Choice FM on 1 January 1995, after taking over the licence previously operated by Buzz FM. Four years later, Choice was renamed as Galaxy after it was bought out by Chrysalis. Galaxy was sold off to Global Radio in June 2007 in a £170 million deal which saw the group take over The Arrow, LBC and Heart.
The station was relaunched and re-branded as 102.2 Capital on 3 January 2011 as part of a merger of Global Radio's Galaxy and Hit Music networks to form the nine-station Capital radio network. In April 2013, the station along with Heart West Midlands moved to new studios at Eleven Brindleyplace in central Birmingham.
Format
Unlike other stations on the Capital network, the 102.2 Capital licence was to cater primarily for Urban contemporary black music rather than a 'contemporary/chart music-led service'. The radio station format stated that the service should provide 'a rhythmic-based music and information stations primarily for listeners of African or afro-Caribbean origin, but with cross over appeal to young white fans of urban contemporary black music'.
On 1 July 2011, Global Radio requested to change the formats of Capital Birmingham and Capital Scotland which have obligations from previous owners - this is to enable all nine Capital stations to be inline. On 17 November 2011 it was announced Ofcom approved two format change requests.
As of February 2014, the station has resumed opting out of networked programming for two hours each week, broadcasting an overnight specialist show featuring Afro-Caribbean music.
Programming
Local programming is produced and broadcast from Capital's Birmingham studios from 6-10am and 4-7pm on weekdays, 12-4pm on Saturdays and 12pm-4pm on Sundays. The station opts out of the network to broadcast a weekly Afro-Caribbean music show on Friday mornings from 2-4am. All networked programming originates from Global Radio's London headquarters, including the syndicated Vodafone Big Top 40 on Sunday afternoons.
The station's local presenters are Rob Howard and Katy Poulsom (Capital Breakfast), Sacha Brooks (weekday drivetime) and Scott Clarke (weekend afternoons).
News
Capital Birmingham broadcasts hourly local news updates from 6am-7pm on weekdays and 6am-12pm at weekends with headlines on the half-hour during Capital Breakfast on weekdays. The Birmingham newsroom also produces bulletins for sister stations Heart West Midlands and Smooth West Midlands.