Kelowna's heritage radio building on Lakeshore demolished

It hosted one of Kelowna's iconic radio stations from the 1980s and served the city's listeners well into the 2020s.

The building, on the corner of Lakeshore and Cook Roads in the Mission area, has been demolished to make way for a planned condo development.

Pattison Media were the most recent owners of the radio operations there with the popular Beach Radio and The LIZARD brands.

The then-innovative building, with windows allowing light into every office and studio, was originally built by the owners of CKOV in 1982. CKOV is now OV103.9, part of Pattison Media's stable which moved operations to a modern building on Hardy Street off Enterprise in 2024.

Broadcaster Jamie Browne, watched Monday's demolition. He's the grandson of "Big Jim" Browne who founded CKOV in 1931. His family ran the company until it was sold in 1988.

"It's sad but it's also progress," Browne told Kelowna10 at the site. "Broadcasting is an industry of progress. It's served its use. It would be nice to think it would go for another forty years but life is like that. You just have to accept change."

Check out the video as Ara and Toby from Beach Radio embrace the demolition.