After years of technical difficulties that have plagued its operations, ASU’s radio station, the Blaze 1330 AM, has nearly finished moving its music and promotions departments from the Tempe campus to the Downtown Phoenix campus, Station Manager Glen Anderson said.
After the move, the Tempe sports, music and promotions departments will converge with the Downtown-based news department to create one physical location for the Blaze.
Brian Rackham, the new faculty adviser for the Blaze, said that the move to the Downtown campus is currently going well. However, during the cleaning process at the beginning of the move it was clear the 31-year-old station had a lot of old items.
“There was a lot of stuff that had been accumulating over the years,” Rackham said. “Some of it was pretty outdated. Some of it we definitely wanted to keep, but we had to figure out where to put it.”
Mark Lodato, the assistant dean of the Cronkite School who approved the move for the three Tempe departments, shared similar sentiments regarding the outdated equipment.
“The reality is a lot of the equipment that is in Tempe is antiquated and was in need for a major upgrade if we were going to stay in that facility,” Lodato said. “That prompted us to take a closer look at what was the long-term future of the radio station and what was most beneficial for our students and the university.”
He also said that the move from the Tempe to the Downtown campus made the most sense financially, especially when comparing the cost of upgrading all the equipment in Tempe to the cost of simply moving the Blaze’s departments. The Walter Cronkite School already has updated equipment in its radio studio, ready for the disc jockeys to use.
The decision was finalized a few months ago in April, according to Anderson. He and Rackham agreed the information technology and engineering departments have been a huge help with the transition, which required updates to the Cronkite School’s system.
Anderson said that many of the returning Blaze members have already begun to do their shows, but the official date for the entire radio station to go live is Sept. 9.
“That’s the day that our schedule we have on our website will be accurate,” Anderson said.
Lodato expressed high hopes for what the move will do for the Downtown campus and downtown area.
“It has an impact on the Downtown campus in that there will be a more visible Blaze effort in various activities downtown,” Lodato said. “In terms of the downtown community as a whole, it just brings that much more attention to what ASU is all about Downtown and I think that is always nice.”
Contact report at hmarrow@asu.edu
