On the other hand…AM radio listenership skews older, and one of the major segments of AM radio stations today is non-English-language formats. Those users may not be as easily able to access streaming options: they may not have smartphones, they may not be as technologically adept.
And may not be buying new cars.
I am not saying that the audience is non-existent. I am saying that it’s so small that it’s not worth it to car manufacturers to incorporate them in new designs.
I’m sad about the loss of a quaint format that held a lot of fond childhood memories for me. And a bit unsettled at the prospect that eventually instead of just turning on the radio and hearing stuff, we’ll need to jump through the hoops of paid subscription and bluetooth pairing and special adapters, etc.
Not really sad about the loss of weirdo AM political/religious shows. If those are gone, it’s objectively a benefit to society.
Both FM radio and cell phone service as line of sight and there are large sections of the country (particularly the very rural mountain West) where FM and cell phone service are not available. AM radio however relies on ground wave and skywave signal propagation, thus making it available to a significant fraction of these non-served FM and cell-phone areas.
I hope Ford will offer AM/FM as an upgrade option for buyers that want it. I can see making FM with an Aux jack the standard package.
That would be a reasonable solution for gas powered vehicles.
Ford removed the Aux. jack (at least on the F150) a few years back, not too long after removing the CD player. They offer USB and Bluetooth inputs and if you don’t like that, tough.
Upgrade the radio? That’s next to impossible since the radio/ventilation/heat/AC/media controls (USB and BT) and the backup camera are all integrated into one big plastic control panel and screen that is decidedly not amenablw to a universal replacrment.
Including the AM broadcast band on a contemporary car involves more than using a compatible chip.
The antenna for 500-1600 kHz is different (bigger) from the many radios already installed and taken for granted (keyless entry & start, satellite radio, cellular traffic, Bluetooth, wi-fi, garage door opener, GNSS/GPS, NFC start, tire pressure data, radar systems for blindspot monitoring, assisted cruise ctrl, emergency braking).
The extra band needs to be programmed into the increasingly common integrated infotainment system. The prompt to change audio source (FM>AM>Sat>Aux) needs to be included and there are rules for tuning around that need to be accommodated. For example, what’s the threshold for signal strength when using the radio’s ‘seek’ feature? What happens when the top of the band is reached?
That last one comes to mind since my dad’s car, a swanky Chrysler 300M, doesn’t tune all stations. WRME/MeTV-FM broadcasts on 87.7 MHz but his radio bottoms out at 87.9.
Seeing how the trends are going, they’ll probably offer it only as a subscription service.
I don’t think it is universally unwanted. AM serves as a lifeline to sports, which I think is its greatest attraction to its widest audience. It’s not that everyone is so hooked on sports on a regular basis, but there is usually some sports event that catches one’s interest at times even if it’s once every 4 years. It is also the home of many right wing talk radio shows (regardless of what one may think of that). I personally on occasion also will use it to hear some news, though that is admittedly rare as most of my car listening is smartphone based, but the format of new radio is just cleaner to listen to then internet based options.
Now I’m picturing some right wing radio host claiming that Ford is trying to “cancel” him by eliminating AM radio.
It already happened as cited earlier in the thread:
I had thought of that aspect already. And you don’t “add” AM to a radio. I’ve never seen one that didn’t have it. I’ve seen AM only but never without AM.
Yeah, most of us who are old enough grew up thinking of AM radio as the most basic, no-frills kind of radio, and the most basic, no-frills kind of car sound system, that there is.
I listen to AM in the car because that’s where the baseball game is. I guess it’s also on Sirius XM, but that ain’t free like AM is. My traffic and weather on the 8’s is simulcast on FM.
Since I happen to, for now, subscribe to Sirius I guess I can find the baseball with a search. But the baseball used to be free for the listening, which does suck.
I guess if AM goes away, the baseball will show up on FM, too.
Depends on the market, but baseball is already on both AM and the FM in many markets
It almost seems like AM radios in cars are going the way of manual transmissions. It used to be that a manual transmission was the most basic, no frills kind of transmission you could get. It was always the cheapest option. But now most cars don’t even offer a manual in the US, and for some of the few that do you actually have to upgrade to a higher trim level to get the manual. Like some in this thread have already suggested, we may soon reach a point where you’ll have to pay more to upgrade your radio if you still want AM.
All the good stations like Radio Beijing news in Esperanto and Israeli numbers stations are on short-wave, anyway.
Can I pick that up in my car?
While the 80s caused a big change in AM vs. FM in market share, etc. I want to clear up some things about that era:
\1. No station dropped AM in favor of FM in a literal sense. AM stations continued to exist and carry programming. Format changes happened. Not literally decommissioning an AM station and starting a FM one.
\2. Some manufacturers proposed different systems to add stereo to AM. The Reagan admin decided this was one of those “Let the market decide.” situations. So the FCC let systems backwards compatible with mono AM to test things out. A few stations went with one or another of the various systems. A few, and I do mean few, radios were produced that supported AM stereo, but only one of the formats per radio depending on ties to the format creator company.
It did not go well. It died. The last hope for AM to compete with FM fizzled.
(A better strategy was the FCC to set milestones. At time X only the leading two formats would be allowed to continue. At time Y only the one with biggest share would be allowed. Once a single system was picked, then things would have taken off.)
\3. It was after this era that formerly valuable AM station licenses started to become less valuable (but still worth some money in most cases).
Anyway …
AM is a great service for getting radio reception in a lot of places. Not just long distance (which cars are a good example of use), but also inside many buildings (which cars might not be a great example of use), etc.
One worry I have is if these EVs are pushing out so much noise, what happens to radio reception in nearby vehicles or buildings next to major roads? And not just AM but all across the board.
If a car is generating so much EM noise that an AM radio is useless, it’s generating too much EM noise period.
Despite all of this defense of AM, the last time I listened to “standard” AM stations was when I commuted and they (as in two stations in a big market) gave regular traffic reports. But I no longer commute and those infernal “devices” provide other options. Kids today.
I have wondered what’s going to happen in those European countries that dropped AM and more in favor of digital channels when Something Bad happens and people dust off their old radios to try and get some news only to find that can’t get any emergency info at all.
A simple, basic system has the advantage of resiliency.
So…there’s an upside.