German Amateur Radio repeaters disappearing at an alarming rate

Amateur Radio repeaters in Germany are disappearing, but not because there is nobody to use them. Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, has the details:

German hams are the unintended victim of denationalization of that nation’s tower site business and the new owners don’t seem to really want radio hams paying little to nothing to use their facilities.

It all began a few years ago. That’s when German telecommunications regulators decided that the country should get out of owning and maintaining what amounts to commercial towers. It sold them off to the private sector to a company known as DFMG Deutsche Funkturm. They are a German-based international radio site property management group.

About a year ago, DFMG notified the German ham radio community that it was putting several restrictions on their use of the company’s facilities. This included limiting ham radio installations at any given site to a maximum of four antennas with up to a 1 meter squared wind strength and use of no more than 100 watts of combined electric mains power.

Amateur Television Quarterly Magazine says that the hardest hit so far by these restrictions are the sponsors of systems that are very power demanding like fast scan ATV and a number of digital modes. Also hit are the national FM linked systems which require multiple radios and antennas at any given site. Much of this is already gone with ATV and packet hardest hit and linking by radio quickly becoming a legacy of the past. A number of FM systems have also had to go off the air or reduce coverage and it might not be over yet.

Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF
Amateur Radio Newsline
Los Angeles

One source told Newsline of a rumored sale of of Germany’s commercial towers to an unnamed French company. If that happens, there’s a chance that radio hams could loose all access to these important radio sites.

Note: An English transcript from a German language article titled “Chronicles of Decline” by Klaus Kramer, DL4KCK, appears in the fall 2007 issue of Amateur Television Quarterly magazine. While not colloquialized English, it does give detail on who has already gone off the air, who is still on and what is being done to keep repeaters in that nation on-the-air. At least at the time that article was written.

http://www.southgatearc.org/news/november2007/german_repeaters.htm

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