First air date 1 May 1989 | Format Classic hits | |
Broadcast area Bradford, Kirklees and Calderdale Slogan "Good Times Great Music/ The Greatest Hits of the 60s 70s & 80s"/ The Greatest Hits of All Time" Frequency MW: 1278, 1530 kHz
DAB: 11B Audience share 3.1% (September 2016, [1]) | ||
Pulse 2 is a British radio station owned by Wireless Group. It is the AM sister station of Pulse 1.
Contents
Background
The station was previously known as Pennine Radio, Classic Gold, Great Yorkshire Gold, Great Yorkshire Radio, 1278 and 1530 AM West Yorkshire, West Yorkshire's Big AM, Pennine's Big AM, West Yorkshire's Classic Gold and Pulse Classic Gold and under previous ownership was part of the Yorkshire Radio Network.
When, in 1989, Pennine Radio was split into Pennine FM and Classic Gold, the AM service became part of a network, initially with sister stations in Hull and Sheffield. In 1997, bosses decided to buy in the former GWR Classic Gold service and produced local programming at breakfast. A couple of years later, Classic Gold was dropped in favour of becoming part of the BIG AM network with sister stations in Stoke and Manchester. Shortly after, Gold reappeared, simulcasting the GWR/UBC Classic Gold and latterly GCap Gold network.
However, on 1 December 2008 the station was re-launched as a fully local service for West Yorkshire and is one of the very few legacy ILR AM stations in England to broadcast local programming.
Programming
The majority of Pulse 2's programming is produced and presented from its Bradford studios. The nightly late show and a Sunday afternoon show, Flashback 40, originates from sister AM station Signal 2 in Stoke-on-Trent. A syndicated show from Chris Country Radio also airs on Sunday evenings.
The station's local presenters are Chris Johnson (Monday - Saturday breakfast), Jacqui Blay and Paul Clark. Paul Carrington presented until 29 July 2016, when he left the station.
News
Pulse 2 broadcasts local news bulletins hourly from 6am to 6pm on weekdays and from 8am to 12pm on weekends. Headlines are broadcast on the half hour during weekday breakfast and drivetime shows, alongside thrice daily showbiz bulletins.
The station also simulcasts hourly Sky News Radio bulletins at all other times.