U.S./Canadian cities with most OTA

[dheian]

Just curious if there's an easy way to determine...or even just common knowledge...which U.S. and Canadian cities have the most channels available to someone tossing up an antenna tower in their backyard. Tropo signals excluded.

As in "due to their location on the border and elevation, people living in Gotham can get up to 45 OTA stations including the nearby cities of Yada Yada and Whoville."

Put another way, how can I rank North American cities by channels readily available?

I know I could pick a list of cities and start doing random TVfools, but man, gotta be an easier way.

[re_nelson]

...how can I rank North American cities by channels readily available?

Distinguishing between number of streams (which counts subchannels) is important to such a count.

For example, in my town, I get a total of 86 streams as shown by a channel scan. But that comes about from only 32 individual stations (analog is completely gone here, everything has been digital for quite some time, even the low power facilities). That's only the local stations, excluding tropo and other forms of DX.

Without desiring to direct traffic elsewhere, the Market Listings page of Trip's RabbitEars site shows a total station count. For Toronto/Hamilton, the count is 23. Montreal is 14 and Vancouver is 18.

[querty-m4n]

From running the Google Earth FCC data I compiled a small list of what I saw.

1) Seattle/Vancouver
2) Metro Toronto/New York State
3) Ottawa/New York State/New Hampshire

#2 would be the most OTA digital stations, however I don't live there so I can't really say.

This is an interesting topic.

[ota_canuck]

If you include sub-channels, then Atlanta Georgia is sub-channel heaven.

[rmchahn]

As far as Canadian ota stations is concerned, Ottawa receives the most; it's the only city to be able to receive all English and French network stations. I wish the city was closer to the border to be able to receive the U.S. stations.

[dheian]

Thanks for the replies so far. (I say so far, 'cause I love gathering the anecdotal evidence of people actually reporting in from their cities.)

Dang, I love OTA! I think my dream now is to win the lottery and find a massive condo tower (Minto's 500+ feet) with 360 wraparound balconies. An antenna in every direction!

[becks]

Originally Posted by rmchahn

As far as Canadian ota stations is concerned, Ottawa receives the most; it's the only city to be able to receive all English and French network stations. I wish the city was closer to the border to be able to receive the U.S. stations.

You can still get some US stations from Ottawa, I get daily 9 PBS, CBS, FOX, ABC, CW so NBC is the only major station I don't get unless the weather is tropo

[99gecko]

No point in reinventing the wheel. You could just check out Trip's website:

RabbitEars.info

Click on <Listings>. There are several options for you including spreadsheets. I'm not sure if the spreadsheets are updated recently. You would have to ask Trip about that.

It appears that Central Nevada is king at 55. I assume some of those are duplicate feeds from the same network, just different stations.

Are you planning to move?

[ScaryBob]

Historically, the Detroit region was the densest market for stations. I believe that includes TV, FM and AM radio stations. The region includes stations from Detroit, Toledo, Windsor, Cleveland, Flint and, possibly, Ann Arbor. All of those cities (with the current exception of Windsor) have a full complement of network stations plus a number independent stations. There are also a number of educational institution stations (at least for FM.) TV could be a different story but Detroit would still be high on the list.

[OTANUT]

Originally Posted by ScaryBob

Historically, the Detroit region was the densest market for stations. I believe that includes TV, FM and AM radio stations. The region includes stations from Detroit, Toledo, Windsor, Cleveland, Flint and, possibly, Ann Arbor. All of those cities (with the current exception of Windsor) have a full complement of network stations plus a number independent stations. There are also a number of educational institution stations (at least for FM.) TV could be a different story but Detroit would still be high on the list.

"The region includes stations from Detroit, Toledo, Windsor, Cleveland, Flint and, possibly, Ann Arbor."

I am in the Detroit market and you can also include Lansing stations for this region!

[someguy23475]

With my antenna I receive roughly 50 channels, iincluding subchannels, coming from Detroit/Ann Arbor, Windsor/Leamington, Toledo (five stations plus subs), Flint (one station plus subs), and Lansing (two stations, sometimes three plus subs).


I'd say the area near Windsor or Leamington is certainly in the mix for prime OTA reception in Canada.

[mr weather]

Originally Posted by ScaryBob

Historically, the Detroit region was the densest market for stations. I believe that includes TV, FM and AM radio stations.

Growing up in Windsor I would very much agree with that. I have read that was one reason why cable tv took so long to get to Windsor. We didn't see the point of paying to watch tv when we were getting it for free already (my parents finally succumbed in 1988).

I have also read that OTA penetration in Windsor is still the highest in Canada, upwards of 30%.

[Trip]

Originally Posted by 99gecko

No point in reinventing the wheel. You could just check out Trip's website:

RabbitEars.info

Click on <Listings>. There are several options for you including spreadsheets. I'm not sure if the spreadsheets are updated recently. You would have to ask Trip about that.

The spreadsheets are maintained by Falcon_77 as he is able to do so. Whatever date you see on the files is the date they were updated.

It appears that Central Nevada is king at 55. I assume some of those are duplicate feeds from the same network, just different stations.

Most are. Central Nevada is very sparsely populated and so that "market" covers vast areas with very little population.

- Trip

[ScaryBob]

This is OT but some food for thought... I wonder how a sparse area like Nevada can support so many stations while Canadian broadcasters claim they cannot make a profit in some of the 10 largest Canadian urban markets. It's obvious that something is terribly wrong with the Canadian broadcasting system and the way it is regulated.

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

[Trip]

Originally Posted by ScaryBob

This is OT but some food for thought... I wonder how a sparse area like Nevada can support so many stations while Canadian broadcasters claim they cannot make a profit in some of the 10 largest Canadian urban markets. It's obvious that something is terribly wrong with the Canadian broadcasting system and the way it is regulated.

There's a big difference between the two.

In setting up something like the transmitters in Toronto or London, you have to have an antenna rated for high power, a transmitter and feed line rated for high power, some type of fiber or microwave link from the studio to the transmitter, plus a backup path in case the primary fails, backup power, possibly even a backup transmitter and/or antenna.

On the contrary, these translators are built to be cheap, not reliable. They pick up an existing over-the-air feed, whether from the main station or from another translator, meaning it's unreliable. They often transmit at power levels of 100 watts or less; a number Utah translators operate at 6 watts ERP. They're on very high mountain tops, so no tower is necessary other than a short pole next to the building, and because of the low power, you don't need more expensive gear made for dealing with high-power. Plus there's little or no redundancy; if the translator unit fails, it's out until it can be removed (often a problem in Winter), shipped to the manufacturer, shipped back, and reinstalled, meaning they can be out of service for months depending on the number of backup units they have (if any) versus the number of failures.

The other thing to remember is that most of these translators got money from the government to either pay part or all of their transition costs.

- Trip