[BC] Vertical or Horizontal

[Tom Taggart]

About a dozen years ago, or so, on a Mediterranean cruise, I picked up several Croatian FM stations while we were heading south through the Adriatic. As I remember, the news/talk stations were vertically polarized, the music stations horizontal.

Consider most of European FM radio in the not-to-distant past.  Most countries had only government run stations, with the antennas usually installed on either TV towers, or on the local "Post-Telegraph" microwave tower.  Then consider the audience in the larger cities. Most commuted by tram, train or metro.  Most lived in apartment buildings, either using a community TV antenna, or some kind of indoor antenna.

So, government-owned broadcasters with a TV focus, setting up FM services for folks who mostly live (and listen) in apartment buildings, probably with the FM tuner jeeped into the TV antenna.  Now the German affinity for horizontal polarization makes more sense. 

Of course, over the last dozen years European radio has become much more like American radio used to be (pre-consolidation) with many local privately-owned stations. Commuting by car is more widespread, so the car radio audience has increased...in parts of Europe. Land use controls still keep sprawl under control in other areas. (Germany, for one). So I suspect even in Germany we will see more use of combined H/V antennas, or CP in the future.

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