A Day-trip to Madison, Wisconsin

On the Sunday of my Chicago trip (see Chicago, 7--8 October 2004 et seq.), I decided to visit Madison, Wisconsin, and see what the difference between market #3 and market #103 makes. One thing you notice very quickly about the Madison market is its attraction to the word "progressive": there are no fewer than three radio stations and one newspaper all calling themselves "progressive". (I didn't stay overnight to see if there was a "progressive" TV newscast as well....)

Madison turns out to be a nifty little market, with two very tall candelabra towers and a few directional AMs, with almost everything ranged along Beltline Highway (US 12/14/18) south of downtown. The only interesting exceptions were WTSO (1070 Madison), which is off US 51 south and east of Madison, and WNWC (1190 Sun Prairie, the erstwhile WMAD) to the northeast; I saw neither.

While in Madison I listened almost exclusively to Entercom's AAA WMMM (105.5 Verona); I found the somewhat more modern sound of "Triple M" to be more to my liking than Chicago's Infinity-owned heritage AAA, WXRT (93.1).