THE future of a Stockport radio station hangs in the balance after media regulator Ofcom refused a request by management for it to share facilities with its sister stations from a base outside its transmission area.

Management at UTV Radio requested permission for the relocation of Imagine FM citing concerns that the station was not financially viable as a stand-alone business and insisting that the station's character would not change.

As previously reported by the Media Business Page, UTV Radio asked the regulator for permission to co-locate Imagine FM, the commercial station for the Stockport area, at its north west broadcast centre in Warrington, which already houses three other local stations.

It is the second time UTV has sparked controversy with a co-location request in recent years but the company argues that it makes more business sense for its stations to share resources at one central base.

The UTV stations which already operate from Warrington are 102.4 Wish FM, covering Wigan and St Helens, 107.2 Wire FM, covering the Warrington and Widnes area, and Tower FM covering Bolton. Ofcom launched a public consultation exercise because of the potential target audience which might be affected by the move and has now rejected UTV Radio's request.

A spokesman for the regulator said: "Large stations, such as Imagine FM which have an adult population of more than 250,000 adults, should operate within its own licensed area unless in exceptional circumstances.

"In this case, UTV failed to provide sufficient evidence on the cultural affinity between Stockport and Warrington and failed to demonstrate that the co-location was required to ensure the financial viability of Imagine FM."

Chris Hurst, managing director of UTV Radio's independent local radio stations, said: "We are aware of Ofcom's ruling following our co-location request for 104.9 Imagine FM. We are obviously disappointed by the judgement."