Iowa’s only public jazz radio station, KCCK-FM, is relocating its broadcasting translator from the old Kirkwood Iowa City Campus to a new tower in partnership with Z102.9, also known as KZIA.

KCCK Manager Dennis Green said he hopes the signal will be up again by the end of the year, but it could be sooner depending on how fast the translator can be moved and installed.

KCCK is owned by Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids. KCCK is a relatively low wattage station operating at 10,000 watts, where other stations operate around 50 to 100,000 watts. This means that KCCK has a smaller footprint for broadcasting.

The station utilizes a translator to boost its signal from the Cedar Rapids 88.3 frequency to Iowa City on the 106.9 frequency.

The old Kirkwood Iowa City campus, located on Lower Muscatine Road, housed KCCK’s translator until it was sold last spring. The new owner of the property did not want to keep the tower, which meant the translator had to move to maintain complete coverage over Iowa City.

Green said the 88.3 signal has improved over the years and now covers a majority of northern Iowa City. The south area had historically spottier coverage which the translator helped cover.

KCCK was able to find a unique solution by working with KZIA, Green said. KZIA has two translators in Iowa City located on North Dodge Street. Green said by using a combiner, they can combine the KZIA and KCCK translators to broadcast from the same tower.

Green said this was a great solution because it means they don’t have to add another antenna and result in lower costs in terms of rental prices and installation costs. Additionally, the combined signal means the frequency will have less conflict going out to Iowa City.

“It’s really a win-win situation for all of us,” Green said.

The signal may also increase coverage range by an increase in power from the tower. The original 106.9 transmitter used about 100 watts. The new location will allow the translator to operate around 200-250 watts, this will not double the coverage range but Green said the coverage will be improved from the change.

“We’ll probably go from covering a portion of the southern part of Iowa City into Johnson County to being able to blanket most of Iowa City and Coralville,” Green said.

CEO of KZIA Julie Hein said the company is happy to see the solution work out with KCCK.

“On the engineering front, everybody’s friends. With a public broadcaster like Kirkwood, we’re all friends and just the impact that Kirkwood has on the counties they’re in is amazing,” Hein said.

Radio broadcast engineer, Jim Davies, worked to come up with a solution for the translator and said the solution benefits both KZIA and KCCK.

“The tower owner is happy because it doesn’t load up the tower as much, and in this case, allowed KZIA just a little bit more power,” Davies said. “My guess is where the tower is at compared to where it was people will see a little better coverage or improvement. It’s a win-win.”

KCCK continues to bring jazz music to Iowa and has engaged in a variety of ways within local communities to continue the love of jazz.

Green said KCCK operates a jazz education program called the Corridor Jazz Project, which works with 20 high school jazz bands and merges them up with a guest artist to do a professional recording project.

KCCK also works with the University of Iowa jazz department to broadcast concerts and works closely with the jazz combo contest.

“We realize that jazz will only continue to grow and thrive if we do everything we can to make sure that we’re developing a new audience,” Green said.