These applications will be for services operating on FM only and the closing date for applications is Tuesday 24 October 2017 at 3pm.
Only those in an area on the list below can apply at this time. The list is made up of areas where expressions of interest were received by the regulator late last year. It includes places in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland but excludes Wales.
England
Barton upon Humber, Barrow upon Humber, East Halton and surrounding areas of Lincolnshire
Birkenhead, Wirral
Birmingham and Sandwell
Bradford
Bristol
Coventry
Eastleigh, Hampshire
Farnborough, Fleet and Yateley in Hampshire and Camberley in Surrey
*Greenwich, Lewisham and Tower Hamlets, London
Harlow, Essex and surrounding areas
Kirklees
Leeds
Leicester
*London Borough of Croydon
*London Borough of Tower Hamlets
Milton Keynes
Newcastle and Gateshead
Norwich
Nottingham
Reading and surrounding areas of Berkshire and north Hampshire
Moss Side, Hulme & surrounding areas of south central Manchester
*South east London
*Tottenham/Haringey, London
Waterlooville, Hampshire
Wolverhampton and Dudley
*Ofcom has recently completed a community radio licensing round in London and other areas within the M25, as a result have carried out extensive frequency availability work in these areas and it is highly unlikely that Ofcom will find additional frequencies for sites in the areas asterisked.
Northern Ireland
Ards and North Down
Belfast
Derry/Londonderry
Scotland
Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire
Cumbernauld
East Lothian
Glasgow
Ofcom warns stations to research their transmission proposals before submitting the non-refundable £600 application fee: “We anticipate that some applications are likely to be rejected at this stage of the process. In other words, if the chosen transmission site is not appropriate for the proposed service area, or there is no suitable FM frequency to support the service, the application will be rejected and we will not take the application forward for consideration against the selection criteria set out in the legislation. The application fee is non-refundable under these circumstances, so we strongly recommend that applicants seek expert frequency planning advice and take particular care when selecting their transmission site.”
Source: http://radiotoday.co.uk/2017/07/ofcom-invites-more-community-radio-applications/