40th Anniversary Week Celebrations

Town Hall, Monday 13th April

And so we have entered our 40th year of community broadcasting, and we’ve been overwhelmed by the support, accolades and praise.

City Park Radio was granted a Town Hall Civic Reception by the Launceston City Council, in recognition of a four decade contribution to the community. Mayor Matthew Garwood welcomed dignitaries, station founders, life members, interstate visitors and volunteer broadcasters past and present, and then gave a summary of how City Park Radio began its 40 year journey in 1978. After eight years of perseverance, licensing hurdles, technical challenges and fundraising, 7LTN FM began permanent licensed broadcasting on 14th April, 1986.

He then thanked the hundreds of station volunteers on behalf of the City of Launceston, for the vision, resilience, belief and dedication to serving the community over 40 years. It’s lasted, and it has mattered. The station has been a trusted presence in our community. It has helped share the diversity of voice. Mayor Garwood also told the audience of the council’s advocacy with us for a DAB service to northern Tasmania.

President John and Vice President Chris then gave a more detailed story of how the station became City Park Radio, and reflected on our history.
(pics: Hector Russell)

 

DOWNLOAD MAY ROSTER HERE

CPR Studios, Tuesday 14th April

Our celebration culminated in a very special broadcast hosted by President John Elcomb and ably assisted by a series of guests who told the story of 7LTN-FM and City Park Radio over its full and fascinating 48 years.

We heard from founding members David Sice and Chris Sayer, to long term broadcasters Joy Elizabeth and Ross Peddlesden. We also met Sally Partridge, who was the instigator of the station’s clandestine fanzine and fanclub Ghettogirls that supported Australia’s first Hip hop program Ghettoblast. Ben Little and Karl Walker hosted this groundbreaking show from our studios at Alanvale TAFE in the late 1980s and moved with us to the Cottage upstairs studio. Our 40th celebration ended with a recorded message from Ben from his home in Darwin.

The broadcast also took the time to remember the many station workers who have died, and announced a project to create a memorial in this Anniversary Year. Pavel then hosted a celebratory program in Czech, and the evening celebrations wound up with a feast from The Vault, as Chris Sayer presented a superbly curated series of conversations and reflections from City Park Radio personalities – some well known for their programs and others who went on to great things elsewhere.
This program and the Civic Reception Speeches will soon be available to replay at your leisure through our website podcast page.

 

The return of our Thursday afternoon radio serials

These radio plays are the marvellous work of their creator – writer, producer, illustrator and CPR member Royce Pentaghast.

Nerys and Morrigan is the next chapter in the story of fantasy mystery series, The Misadventures of Agnetha Deveaux. Cheeky and chaotic, these two ladies set about “removing” people they feel cause a danger to the world, but things rarely go according to plan. Episode 1 aired on the 30th April, with episodes 2 and 3 airing in early June.

The Adventures of Rey Skywalker is a Star Wars fan production from Royce Pentaghast (Geeks Review, Misadventures) continuing the Star Wars saga. Jedi Rey is in hiding on a farming world but finds herself targeted by troublesome pirates. Hear it on Thursday 7th May at 4pm.

Also from May 14th to 28th, “The Lady Felicity Mysteries”. from the world of Agnetha Deveaux,
You can hear all of these locally produced radio plays on the Thursday dates noted here, after the 4pm news, on City Park Radio.

CPR’s album show “Side1, Track1” returns

Your City Park Radio presenters love music, and relish the opportunity to bring you a different album each week in the return of the popular program “Side1, Track1”. Back by popular demand, this weekly program will highlight an album from any decade and genre, giving you in-depth research into the recording while featuring the album in its entirety. Coming up you’ll hear the likes of The Who, Billy Joel, George Harrison, Maria McKee and Chris Rea, with many more as the year progresses.

THINKING OF PRESENTING?

You can be like Harry, pictured here with trainer Chris Sayer, and be let loose on your own program where you can play your own song choices – well, within our broad program guidelines. All it takes is a commitment to learn the panel, and to be yourself when you turn on the microphone.
We welcome new presenters of all ages, cultures, backgrounds and music tastes. We will train you how to use our facilities to either present live-to-air, or pre-record for later broadcast. We even have a podcast corner for spoken-word creations.

What are you waiting for … ​?

GARDEN PARTY

The City Park Cottage garden came alive under twinkling fairy lights for the Volunteer Party on Ruby Tuesday. The cottage hosted a screen presentation of images captured over the last 48 years – during the license campaign and since being granted a license on 14 April 1986.
We hope to have more celebration gatherings over this year and would like to be sure we include members as well as volunteers with whom we are no longer in touch. If you know someone who would like to reconnect with their old radio station, please ask them to give the station a call on 6334 3344 weekdays before 3pm.

THANKS ROSS

An unexpected hero of the celebration broadcast was an interstate visitor who helped us troubleshoot technical issues and found himself very happily mixing the Studio D broadcast from the control booth. Ross Peddlesden was one of three Station Producers who in 1986 learned to work across station roles to assist in all circumstances and provide on the job training to presenters.
Ross didn’t expect to be thrown into the role for a night when he came to party but with every volunteer stretched to the max, when a shortfall was identified in the hour before the Studio D broadcast, he jumped in to the role again with a huge smile on his face that lasted all night.
Thanks Ross, and Muriel Rollins and Dave Mohr who also assisted getting our celebration to air from Studio B without much notice.

Many thanks to all our volunteers who worked hard on catering for Ruby Tuesday,

MOMENTUM

The Anniversary celebrations have helped workers build momentum for the station renewal projects that are being planned as part of. If you ever thought you’d like to become involved at some level in the station community now is an excellent time to dip your toe in the water. We absolutely value people who are interested in exploring roles other than programming, as well as those interested in technical operations, production and presentation. You’re welcome to come and have a Cuppa and Yarn on Saturdays from 10AM-12PM and take things at your own pace to find a role where you can thrive.

The “40 Voices for 40 Years” project

This project received a small Launceston City Council grant to cover costs of participants who will be recruited from the community and the station to work collaboratively to create 2-3min audio packages for broadcast as part of this Anniversary year.
In a radio context, “package” means a pre-produced audio segment (usually of 1-3 minutes) that’s ready to go to air. It’s edited, structured, and usually tells a complete story.
The project aims to foster skill development and diversity of voices and themes as participants can bring their own ideas to develop into the packages. In the process the project aims to breathe new life into the area of training at City Park Radio.
Training modules are under development and in the months of June -August should provide an excellent winter project to get one’s teeth into. We’ll let you know when applications are being called for.

Teamwork …

Following the breakfast program on Anniversary Day, Ruby Tuesday, where Ben W and I jointly presented the program, I would like other presenters to come in for the weekend breakfasts to chat and ‘help out’. Both Ben and I enjoyed having someone else around and there was nothing but positive feedback. It’s a good opportunity to flag up your own programs and, who knows, you may want to join the breakfast team. I wouldn’t ask you to be at the station at 5:30am, but you could be!

Call me if you’re interested in joining me for breakfast – John Elcomb on 0428 955 008.

Management Committee 2025/2026

President: John Elcomb
Vice President : Chris Sayer
Secretary: Belinda Prance
Treasurer: Vacant
General Committee: Ayu Rohmana, Ben Barwick, Bruce Webb, Vivi Turbaninigsh. Richard Barker