If Bell Globemedia Inc. is okayed to take over CHUM Limited the company's combined OTA TV assets in the Lower Mainland would be:

CIVT 32 Analogue (CTV Mt. Seymour)
CIVT-DT 33 Digital (CTV Mt. Seymour)
CKVU 10 Analogue (CITY-TV Salt Spring Island)
CKVU-DT 47 Digital (Never Activated)

If they decide to shut down the CKVU (CITY) station operations they would then have recourse to using UHF 47 for the CIVT-DT transmissions, with likely a much higher alotted ERP than the pea-shooter alotted to CIVT-DT 33 at present. Likewise they might wish to relocate all their broadcasting to the Salt Spring Island site in order to improve coverage to the Coquitlam/Surrey areas that are in the signal shadow to the southeast of Mt. Seymour. The Salt Spring Island location would allow a bidirectional pattern firing straight up the Fraser Valley in one plane and down to Victoria in the opposite plane.

I checked the IC/FCC databases to see where the nearest UHF 47 station(s) might be, and apart from some pipsqueak translators like the Global analogue repeater in Campbell River, as well as an old application for a DT on 47 for SeaTac (which doesn't really mean much unless a Construction Permit is actually issued and one never was) the only major one I could find is KYVE in Yakima, WA on Analogue 47 with a Construction Permit for DT on 47:

http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/tvq?list=0&facid=33752#10002

Given the mountains in between Yakima and Vancouver I don't expect there would be much interference problems factoring into an IC/FCC ERP decision.

CKVU-DT 47 Digital (Never Activated)
LOL, isn't that the truth!

Since this deal looks like it will be okayed, if it hasn't already, I'll offer up my suggestion. Move the analogs over to Saltspring, and keep the digital(s) on Mt.Seymour. AND swap the allotments so that CTV can be on 47UHF, and CKVU-DT (if it ever happens) can have the peashooter 33UHF. Though CIVT-DT being on a higher frequency would require more power to cover the same footprint, and without a nearby station to interfere with, they might have the b@ll$ to turn up the juice, after getting the CRTC's permission of course. Might we see the day where CTV has double digit kWatt ERP?

Mind you, this scenario is completely biased to my setup. But can you blame me for hoping? :D heh

Move the analogs over to SaltspringThey could move CTV analogue over to the Channel 10 transmitter on Salt Spring, but that assumes they'd be killing off CITY because that transmitter's been around since at least February, 1985 if it was bought new, so I'm guessing its an old GE or RCA unit that would be of no use for digital broadcasting or dual channel hosting. The present UHF digital transmitter for 33.1 up on Mt. Seymour could be reconfigured for 47.1 without too much difficulty.

I just noticed now that CIVT-DT is back at full strength (must have been a recent change because I check often)... In fact, it's higher now than I've ever seen it. I'm getting 92-95% signal strength.

im ctv hd with no glitches now just in the last few days...

btw ota hd does look much better than shaw or satellite.

i heard that shaw doesnt compress ctv or cbc but after having both ota and cable id say shaw does compress them (but not as much as their other hd channels so they stand out)...

Any of you have any updates on chs. 6,8,10,17,32, and 42 and their plans for HD broadcasting. Using an antenna on my garage in Bellingham I'm picking up a beautiful (16:9) OTA picture from cbut ... 58.8 on my set. Would love to see the same from the others. Any news?

Thanks

Hope this is the right place to post this inquiry!

with CHAN-DT set to go live this fall, when would it be normal to expect to see test patterns? Nothing on digital ch.22 yet.

Does anyone have any info on when KVOS-DT will be going full power? Last I heard was this August.

Earlier this year, when I asked KVOS about their new transmitter (in around may/june), they told me the broadcast from it would start in 1 year - which sounded kind of too long, but I still hope is not true.
Hope it will show up much sooner.

When I contacted BCTV, I was told that they are cancelling their original plans to start broadcasting CHAN-DT from Mt Seymour, as originally planned for September, due to some problems of upgrading the tower. I still hope this will prove to be incorrect, as I was very eager to see Global HD this fall.

My guess is that the next offair HD signal will be that of Channel M (CHNM-DT), either that or KVOS-DT (probably SD).
I still keep hoping things will speed up with this slow HD revolution, for us here.
God Speed!

When I contacted BCTV, I was told that they are cancelling their original plans to start broadcasting CHAN-DT from Mt Seymour, as originally planned for September, due to some problems of upgrading the tower. I still hope this will prove to be incorrect, as I was very eager to see Global HD this fall.

My guess is that the next offair HD signal will be that of Channel M (CHNM-DT), either that or KVOS-DT (probably SD).
I still keep hoping things will speed up with this slow HD revolution, for us here.
God Speed!

What a suprise from Global. CIII-DT like CHAN-DT, east like west. You know that's where they came up with that briliant line of "problems upgrading". It worked for them back east, it would work out west too. I too would like to see CHAN-DT up and running as planned, but didn't put too much hope on it. Infact, I think I'm going to email them and let them know I'll be watching their competitor's DT offerings to the complete exculsion of CHAN-TV. And I won't stop there, I'll email CHAN's advertisers that I won't be watching Global because of their lackluster effort towards DTV... that'll hit'em where it hurts! You can join me in this boycott if you want it to be more effective.

I emailed Global and asked a polite question about their DT plans for Vancouver and got no response. Is there a better email address to use? How about the CRTC?

Those of you who wish to communicate with Global should not try the Vancouver staff. It is well known that CanWest Global is a very top-down organization run out of their Winnipeg headquarters, so the thing to do is directly email Mr. Leonard Asper through one of the email addresses provided here:

http://www.canwestglobal.com/contactus/index.html

As for contacting Glen Altwasser of Vancouver Global TV, he is a nice guy who is respected in the industry and we need to let him off the hook and leave him be. Please look through the DHC rules regarding posting of contact info of individuals.

cheers,
stampeder

I emailed 'General Corporate Inquiries' at CanWest Global about the Vancouver DT status. Worth a try I guess.

I was at the PNE the other day, and asked a member of their technical crew about their HD newscast plans. To my suprise they dont have any immediate plans for local news in HD, but will rent/lease HD studio equipment by the time the 2010 olympics are here, and will likely keep it for afterwards as well. So there you have it.

I didn't ask about Canada AM and the nightly news with Lloyd Robertson going to HD, but I presume it'll be in HD before local stations' newscasts are in HD because it's national and has the viewership to justify the HD camera and HD graphics equipment costs.

Oh, and I also recently emailed corporate Canwest Global. I hope I hear back from them.

The very friendly people over at Channel M have been so kind as to inform me of their DTV status. I asked about their ERP limit potentially being too low (quoting CIVT-DT's ERP), but they assure me it'll be enough. I'll believe them until proven otherwise. They don't have a set go live date yet, but it won't be any sooner than April or May of 2007. Their on-air date in Vancouver will correspond to their on-air date in Victoria as well (they're wanting to go live in both places at the same time).

I also offered my assistance, by way of reception results, and hinted that many DHCers would also be more than willing to convey their reception statistics, location and setup, in the hopes of optimizing overall reception. They liked the idea of "eyes in the field", and will be in contact with me when the time comes closer to broadcast. I will post any new info as it comes to me.

The program guide for CBUT is now showing up with programming and the correct time. The program data is available for a week in advance.

But....
The start and end time for programs is shifted. For me, programs listed on the program guide start and end 3 minutes before they should (e.g. National runs from 21:57 - 22:57)

I went to Robson and Burrard today wanting to talk to someone in station promotions, but they'd gone home for the day. The receptionist asked me why I wanted to talk to someone from promotions. I told the receptionist that I would like to inquire about a station advertisment promo'ing the fact that they're broadcasting digitally off-air. She wrote down an email address for me to send the request to. She said that she actually receives it and forwards it on to the appropiate people. She also mentioned that she's only had one other similar request, and that if there were enough requests, CTV would probably consider making a DTV off-air station advertisment.

if you'd like to see a "Vancouver's watching CTV in High Definition, Channel 33 UHF" station advertisment, click on this link (mailto:bccomments@ctv.ca&subject=HD off-air station ad). And ask them to consider making one, maybe even in HD?

My fellow DHCers, I went to CTV today and asked reception how many other people have emailed in to ask for a "Vancouver's watching CTV HD..." ad, and there was just one other soul who wrote in. Come on people, do your part and write in, they're not going to take us seriously if just two people ask them for a HD station ad.

Click on the link above, and voice your support for HD proliferation. The word about HD via off-air needs to reach the masses, before we'll see any changes in our electronic retail stores. Simple supply and demand.

I spoke to the Engineering Dept at Canwest Global this morning in Burnaby. They tell me that they have finally revceived the licence to construct the new digital towers/equipment from the CRTC. This came in last week. Not that's not to say they are going ahead. They further told me that it is costly to do this upgrade across the 42+ towers across BC. There are currently doing an assesment to see if its worth it. So in short they are getting closer, but it seems it still maybe some time yet before we see Global HD in Vancouver.


Cheers,

Roger

Bittersweet news. It's great they're looking at upgrading, but really, they should only be concerned with getting Vancouver's Mt.Seymour tower up and running in digital, THEN worry about the cost of upgrading Victoria, then smaller cities and towns across BC. I don't understand their all or nothing additude. You didn't see the CBC worry about upgrading it's many BC towers before upgrading their main CBUT tower on Mt.Seymour. You really have to wonder if they're just using cost as a scapegoat to not go digital.