STAPLETON — A new online radio station will broadcast live from a former closet inside the Staten Island MakerSpace.
The MakerPark Radio will kick off programming Saturday with a mix of music shows focused on salsa, dance, post-punk and more. The station will broadcast daily from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. and also have a live video feed of DJs in the 450 Front St. booth.
"The idea is that it's supposed to bring together music communities and also neighborhood communities as well as social communities to have a sort of centralized place to have people come together for their mutual love of arts," said Kristin Wallace, who started the station with her husband, Tom Ferrie.
Wallace already programmed 40 shows that will run weekly, bi-weekly or monthly for the station, with of range of focuses such as music, interviews with local artists, beer, cats and a Sri Lankan children's show.
The non-profit station also plans to give a block of time to local groups one day a week as part of a monthly residency program where they develop and put on their own shows.
Wallace, who's worked in the music industry most of her life and makes her own house music, first got into radio when she was in high school and used to steal her sister's ID to get airtime at college stations in New Jersey.
Inspired by other internet radio stations around the world such as the Red Light Radio in Amsterdam and The Lot Radio in Brooklyn, Wallace and her husband decided to start one of their own and got a $3,000 grant from Staten Island Arts in March to get it off the ground.
"It's the worst time to get into radio so therefore the best time to get into radio because there's so many voices that are not really being heard," said Wallace. "It's like the Wild West of streaming radio right now."
They originally planned to build out the studio in a container in the lot across the street from the MakerSpace, but getting the permits to run electric there proved too difficult. After a month delay, the team rushed to build out a studio in the MakerSpace with large windows overlooking Tompkins Street.
The group plans to install speakers outside so passersby can listen to the station and they plan to launch a Kickstarter campaign soon to help raise funds for other improvements to the studio.
Wallace is still on the hunt to find more locals to run their own shows at the station and has started reaching out to cultural groups for different ethnic groups around the borough to recruit DJs.
