About 18 years ago — before the Internet as we know it — the public radio station KIPO 89.3 went on the air, playing mostly jazz.

The signal was weak; two-thirds of O'ahu listeners heard mostly static. That's still the case today. But in a few weeks, all that will change.

A new $1.65 million transmission facility on Tantalus will allow public radio fans to hear KIPO anywhere on O'ahu — on the radio. No longer will most O'ahu residents have to use Internet streaming or digital cable to hear it clearly.

With commercial mass media fracturing technologically over print, television and online, it's almost miraculous that nonprofit radio would be the place where Hawai'i's media expands and improves.

For public radio's dauntless supporters, the stronger signal should come as welcome vindication for all those years of sending money in response to Hawaii Public Radio's relentless pledge drives.

It's also a welcome doubling of intelligent, alternative radio programming for Hawai'i audiences. KIPO will serve as a fully powered sister station to KHPR (88.1), which carries arts and cultural programming, as well as news and information from established sources such as National Public Radio.

The programming for each station eventually will become more defined — KIPO for news and information, KHPR for fine arts and culture.

But both stations will continue to offer something too often missing from commercial radio: a mission dedicated primarily to educate and inform, and to elevate the discussion of our personal, political and cultural lives.