Montreal's TSN Radio 990 To Become French All-Sports Station

Montreal's TSN Radio 990 was "venting its frustration" Tuesday after parent company Bell announced plans "to transform it to a French-language sports station," according to Jason Magder of the Montreal GAZETTE. Bell Media said that "it intends to change" TSN 990 to RDS 990, the radio equivalent of the French Réseau des Sports TV network. The application is "part of the approval process" for Bell to purchase Astral Media, which owns the English-language Chom 97.7 FM, Virgin 96, and CJAD 800 AM. Bell had asked the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission "to make an exception" to its rules governing media concentration, which state that "no company can own more than three English-language radio stations in a given market." That request was denied. If the deal is approved, English-language broadcasts of NHL Montreal Canadiens games would return to CJAD, "where they had been until last season" (Montreal GAZETTE, 7/11).