CJOB, siblings hiring a moving van

By: Morley Walker Posted: 1:00 AM CST Friday, Jan. 8, 2010

WINNIPEG'S top-rated radio station plans to vacate its Portage Avenue building later this year.

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WINNIPEG'S top-rated radio station plans to vacate its Portage Avenue building later this year.

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WINNIPEG’S top-rated radio station plans to vacate its Portage Avenue building later this year.

But CJOB 680 AM, along with its Corus Entertainment-owned sister stations Power 97 FM and Groove 99.1 FM, has still not quite figured out where its going.

"We’ll know for sure within 45 days," the stations’ manager, Garth Buchko, said on Thursday.

"It’s down to the short strokes."

Buchko admitted that the old CTV building at Polo Park was one definite possibility among a short-list of three.

He wouldn’t reveal the other two.

"We are still in negotiations," he said. "Wherever we go, it will be within 10 minutes of downtown and in an area with visibility and vibrancy."

The move has been in the works for three years, he says, and must take place because the stations have outgrown their current location at 930 Portage Ave.

CJOB moved into the building, a former post office, in 1962. The station is Winnipeg’s perennial ratings leader. In the most recent fall ratings period, it captured a 16.2 share of the market.

Power 97 came in 8th a 6.3 share and Groove (the former Cool FM) 12th with a 1.4 share

Aside from inadequate parking, the Portage Avenue location has served the stations well, Buchko says, but several generations of new radio technology have left the building with miles and miles of snaking cables.

"We’ve outgrown the building significantly," he said. "We are in need of a new plant in this digital age."

Toronto-based Corus, which owns the current building, should have it up for sale within 60 days.

Plans for the empty CTV building at Polo Park, owned by Cadillac Fairview, call for a redevelopment into a combined commercial-retail space. The Corus stations would take one floor.

"The location is perfect," Buchko admitted. "The plans for the retail development (of the entire former Winnipeg Arena footprint) are quite spectacular."

About 18 months ago, the company was negotiating with CHUM Radio, which had plans to move its Winnipeg stations (Curve 94.2 FM and CFRW 1290 AM) from their current Pembina Highway location into the new CTV building downtown, but that idea did not pan out, Buchko says.

morley.walker@freepress.mb.ca