The community radio stations of Bath & North East Somerset are working together to apply for the recently advertised small-scale DAB licence for the area.

Bath Digital Radio is a consortium formed by Bath Radio, Imperial Voice Radio, Kik Radio, KTCR (Keynsham Town), Radio Bath and Somer Valley FM. The group have been cooperating for several months and is starting to assemble the proposed line-up of services to broadcast across the City of Bath and out as far as Midsomer Norton.

Dom Chambers, who is the chair of Bath Digital Radio said, "Over the last 15 years we have seen the remarkable growth of local radio in Bath & North East Somerset which has had a unique part to play in the development of community life in our area. With DAB we have the chance to take this to a new level with the increased reach and audience engagement that comes with this opportunity. All the local broadcasters have come together to make this happen and our proposition is all the stronger for that. Let's bring it on."

Bath Digital Radio are working with Muxnet UK who operate Small Scale DAB Multiplexes. They are currently looking for established local community based or not-for-profit radio stations to join as part of their application. They are also appealing for any service, local, regional, or national that might be potentially interested in broadcasting to Bath and the surrounding areas. Radio stations that would be interested in covering this area on DAB can contact the group via [email protected]

Small-scale DAB is an innovative technology which provides a low-cost route for local commercial, community and specialist music services to broadcast on terrestrial digital radio to a relatively small geographical area. A number of small-scale DAB multiplexes have been running on a trial basis over the past five years, but Ofcom is now advertising non-trial small-scale radio multiplex licences.