Swindon 105.5

The original project was founded in 2004 by Ian Rowe, Johnny Robinson and Shirley Ludford who were all former presenters at Swindon FM, along with Richard Grace and Greg Stevens who had both previously worked behind the scenes at the station. Ludford was a former employee of both BBC Wiltshire Sound and GWR FM. She was subsequently appointed Station Manager of the project.

Prior to the launch of the full-time station, Swindon Community Broadcasting, a RSL (Restricted Service Licence) station, was set up in order to discover whether a community radio station could work in the area. Broadcasts took place from The Bulldog pub in Swindon. After positive feedback about the station's success throughout the four-week broadcast it was decided the project would proceed to the next step and apply for a full-time Community Radio Licence from Ofcom.

In 2006, two groups applied for the community radio licence for the Swindon area: Swindon FM Community Radio, which had run a local DAB only service in Swindon since 2002, and Community Radio Swindon, broadcasting as Swindon 105.5. Ofcom decided in favour of Community Radio Swindon and the station was awarded its licence in February 2007. Some of Swindon FM's presenters moved to or have subsequently moved to Community Radio Swindon.[1]

The station's first studio was at the County Ground, home of Swindon Town F.C.,[2] and was for a short time shared with ITV Thames Valley. The inaugural show on 15 March 2008 was presented by Ludford with a former broadcasting colleague from BBC Wiltshire Sound, Peter Heaton-Jones. The station’s first officially played song was the 1964 Martha & The Vandellas single – Dancing in the Street. The original music database was developed by the station's Head of Music and co-founder, Johnny Robinson. The first regular show to air was The Johnny Robinson Show at 7-9 pm on Saturday 15 March. Robinson was apparently "tired and shattered" after helping with preparations for the launch, and had gone without sleep for 36 hours before presenting the show.

The station moved to The Bentley Centre, Stratton Road, Swindon, in the summer of 2010. The move to much larger premises allowed the station to expand to three studios and to have large administration and training areas. Ludford ran the first accredited radio course for nine-year-olds at Drove Primary School in 2011, making them the youngest in the country to gain this certificate. The station's transmitter was moved to the top of the ninety meter high David Murray John Building in the centre of Swindon on 15 March 2013 - coincidentally on the station's fifth birthday.

Ludford was featured in the 2014 Mothers' Day edition of ITV's Surprise Surprise programme which saw Boyzone visit the station and Ludford later visited New York to meet Whoopi Goldberg. Ludford was selected to appear on the show due to her long-term work for the Swindon community. Ludford received the High Sheriff's Award for long service to the community in February 2014 and later in the year The Duke Of Kent visited the station to present the Queen's Award for Voluntary Service in November 2014.[3][4] Dave Woods was nominated for his program, Europe: Does it Matter to Swindon?, in the Current Affairs Documentary category at the Radio Academy’s fifth annual Radio Production Awards.

Due to renovation work at the Bentley Centre, the station moved to their third home, the old Liden Library offices, in January 2016. This move saw the station expand into bigger studios.

Now the Liden Studios, it holds 3 incredible studios and a large production suite for onsite editing. In recent times, remote working has become increasingly easy for presenters and the technical team have worked extremely hard to make sure everyone has access to the correct items, making it very easy to use.

The station holds one of the most technologically advanced system for community radio and provides excellent sounding 24 hour content all year round.

The main broadcasting studio, studio 1 is the studio most live programs come from, it holds a D&R Airlight [5]mixer with 3 microphones, 3 faders for playout, and 2 additional faders for CD’s and phone calls.

The studio was recently renovated to ensure it was ‘keeping up with the times’ and allows all presenters the opportunity to sit behind the live desks and go straight to the airwaves.

Studio 2 is much like studio 1, being the smallest of all the studios it holds a very similar setup to studio 1. It too has recently been renovated to include the same up-to-date features as Studio 1

It has the same D&R Airlight [5]mixer as studio 1 with the exact same configuration for ease of use for the presenters, both studios look incredibly smart and are both great sounding quality mixers.

Studio 3 is the only studio that doesn’t follow the same format. Mainly used for large broadcasts it holds the largest desk allowing for the most configuration to be passed through.

The desk includes 5 microphones faders, 3 playout faders, 2 CD faders, phones and an external source fader, as well as a large stagebox for bands and talk shows.

Known mostly as the events studio it’s used mainly for large events where more microphones and facilities are needed to make the show successful.

The room doubles up as a live performance area, a meeting room and a training facility for the next generation of presenters to pass through Swindon 105.5.