How we started

Way back in December 2013 a launch event was held in Highams Park for a new community group called “The Highams Park Planning Group”, attracting over five hundred Highams Park residents.  One of the questions put to the group was to identify where improvements could be made – a common response was better communications.

Facebook and email groups were set up and posters displayed, but we still had people who felt they did not know what was happening most of the time.  

HPPG grew to over 1200 members and many events were planned and staged; so a team, dedicated to communications, put their heads together and the idea of an internet radio station was born.

Setting this up was not easy.  Where do you start?  Nigel Mear who was running a local live music night suggested contacting Ian Chambers of East London Radio.   

Ian was wonderful.   He gave us tips and ideas; trained a few people up; and helped us get kit, and send off for the appropriate Broadcasting Platform and licenses.  Our local councillors supported us with Ward Forum funding and we were off.

How we developed

We started gathering together local people interested in broadcasting and began training them in how to make pre-recorded programmes.

However, it was not until 2017 that we took a leap and Broadcast live for the first time at a local event from Highams Park Library.

Reaching that milestone was enormous, but we were still broadcasting ELR during the mornings, and scheduling our own home-grown shows during the afternoon and evening, and we had no premises.   The only live broadcasts we were doing were from events like The Spring Fair, Picnic in the Park and Highams Park day.

How we grew

By now we had a library of home-grown shows and no longer needed to rely on the East London Radio feed.

Then in 2020 Covid19 hit.  Our regular meetings were suspended and with nothing else but Whatsapp and the internet at our disposal we needed to act fast.  Our amazing team of David Mear, Vis the Spoon,  Martin Chandler and David Throssell worked out a way for people to broadcast live from home.  At a time when the world closed down, hSpark blossomed and opened up live to Highams Park, London, The UK, and even The World.

Local residents were contacting us to send messages to family locally, across the UK, and to relatives around the world.  During lockdowns we boomed with record listening figures.  

Where we are

We now combine daily and weekly Live shows alongside regular new recorded shows. We have greater links than ever with local organisations and hope to continue to build on those connections.

Anyone can listen to us over the internet, via phones, TVs and more, and we hope to soon be available by asking Alexa!

We hope that you’ve enjoyed listening to our station. There really is something for everyone, so please do take a look at the schedule.

If you don’t see what you want, get in touch and share your ideas. Better still, join us, and we can help you make it!

Thank you for reading all about our history. We hope that you can be part of our future!