Everything about Wnya totally explained
WNYA, channel 51, is the
MyNetworkTV-affiliated
television station for the
Capital District of
New York State and western
New England, licensed to
Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Its transmitter is located northwest of Pittsfield in the
Berkshire Mountains near Berry Pond. The station is owned by Venture Technologies Group and is known on-air as
My4 Albany. The name is derived from WNYA's channel location on area cable systems. The station has studios on Fern Avenue in
Schenectady.
The station operates a full-time Class A repeater,
WNYA-CA. Licensed to
Albany, the station broadcasts an analog signal on UHF channel 15 with no digital signal. Its transmitter is located at the tower farm in the Helderberg Mountains in
New Scotland, New York. The station serves as the Capital District relay of the main WNYA signal.
Overview
Along with MyNetworkTV primetime and overnight
Corner Store TV infomercials,
syndicated programming on WNYA includes
My Wife and Kids,
Still Standing,
According to Jim, and
Becker. There is no news on this station. During the
MLB 2008 season, it'll simulcast
New York Yankees games that are split between
WWOR and the
YES Network.
WNYA and
WCDC-TV (a full-time satellite of
ABC affiliate WTEN) can be considered rimshot signals into the nearby
Springfield /
Holyoke television market.
Digital television
Because it was granted an original
construction permit after the
FCC finalized the
DTV allotment plan on
April 21,
1997 (External Link
), the station didn't receive a companion channel for a digital
television station. Instead, on or before
February 17,
2009, which is the end of the digital TV conversion period for full-service stations, WNYA will be required to turn off its
analog signal and turn on its
digital signal (called a "
flash-cut").
History
WNYA
What today is WNYA can indirectly trace its history to
WUVW, an unbuilt station on channel 51. It was licensed to Pittsfield and was given a permit in the mid-
1950s (the permit was canceled in the
1970s). The allocation that became WNYA was proposed in
October of
1996 by
Pappas Telecasting but went without an owner for several years until it was auctioned off in
February of
2002. Venture Technologies ended up getting the winning bid for $1.3 million. The
FCC granted the construction permit and the
WNYA calls to Venture a year later.
WNYA-CA
What today is WNYA-CA signed on in 1996 known as
WVBX-LP. The station was a repeater of
WVBG-LP that was licensed to
Easton in
Washington County, New York on channel 39. In
September of
1997, WVBG became a
UPN affiliate although the station could never get carriage on
Time Warner Cable. Instead, the cable system offered
WSBK-TV from
Boston. The UPN affiliation ended at the start of
2000 when cable-only "
WEDG-TV" (known later as
UPN 4) signed on. WVBX would then become an independent station before signing off in early-2002. While dark, WVBX was upgraded to Class A status and had its license moved to Albany. A new transmitter was built at the tower farm in the Helderberg Mountains in New Scotland. The station was given the current call letters
WNYA-CA and was announced as becoming a WNYA repeater. Of special note, it's unusual for a repeater station to sign on earlier that its parent station.
UPN Capital Region
In
April of
2003, WNYA's owner signed a joint sales agreement (JSA) with
Freedom Communications (owner of
CBS affiliate
WRGB). WNYA & WNYA-CA announced a sign-on date of
September 1, 2003. WNYA signed on the air in mid-
July for testing purposes (WNYA-CA did the same in late-
August). The official launch of WNYA & WNYA-CA came at 6 A.M. on September 1 with the stations using the
UPN Capital Region branding. WNYA became the first full-powered, over-the-air, UPN affiliate in the Capital District. Although WNYA & WNYA-CA didn't sign-on broadcasting digital signals of their own, there was one offered on WRGB's second digital subchannel. From its sign-on, WNYA took the cable channel position of WEDG-TV on Time Warner,
Charter, and independent Mid-Hudson Cablevision (in
Greene County, New York).
Adelphia cable systems would replace WSBK with WNYA at the start of
2004 with
DirecTV &
Dish Network adding the station later that year.
WNYA's original line-up included several new shows that had gone unclaimed in the market, some not previously cleared, and various older ones. As another byproduct of the JSA, WNYA aired replays of WRGB's weekday Noon (at 1 P.M.) and 11 P.M. (at 11:30) newscasts. WRGB's public affairs program known as
Sunday Morning with Liz Bishop was also included. The practice ended in mid-2004.
WRGB involvement
The JSA between WNYA & WRGB led to some common involvement between the two stations. It was first apparent a mere six hours after WNYA signed on when the station broadcasted CBS's coverage of the
U.S. Open tennis tournament on
Labor Day because of WRGB airing the
Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon during that time. This arrangement continued in 2004, but due to a crop of syndication launches on Labor Day in 2005, it didn't happen that year (U.S. Open Tennis did air on cable on Time Warner Cable channel 3 in the Capital District). There was also some swapping of syndicated programs between the two stations. In late-2005, Freedom Communications signed an extension that was to have kept the JSA agreement in place until the end of
2008 (it had been set to expire on
August 31,
2006).
On
April 17,
2006, it was announced that WNYA would begin airing an hour-long extension of WRGB's weekday morning news at 7 A.M. The newscast was known as
CBS 6 First News on My TV 4 Albany. This move could be seen as a pre-emptive move by WRGB to fend off a challenge by
FOX affiliate
WXXA-TV which had announced their plans to launch weekday morning news two weeks earlier. Rumors of WRGB producing a 10 P.M. newscast on WNYA had circulated as well, however the pickup of a second run of
Dr. Phil to air at that hour killed the rumors.
On
June 19,
2006, Freedom Communications announced the purchase of
WB affiliate
WEWB from
Tribune Broadcasting for $17 million dollars. This purchase was finalized on
December 6, giving the Capital District its first duopoly. As a result, WRGB began to control three stations in the market.
In
February of
2007, the JSA with WRGB was terminated. As a result, the second digital subchannel broadcast of WNYA's digital signal was supposedly terminated as well. Its website had listed WRGB's street address for advertising information. WNYA is now located at 17 Fern Avenue (where
WMHT once was) in Schenectady.
MyNetworkTV
Back on
January 24, [2006, The WB and UPN announced that they'd end broadcasting and merge. The newly combined network would be called
The CW. The letters would represent the first initial of its corporate parents, CBS (the parent company of UPN) and the
Warner Bros. unit of Time Warner.
On
February 22,
News Corporation announced that they'd start up another new broadcast television network called
MyNetworkTV. This new network, which would be sister to FOX, would be operated by
FOX Television Stations and its syndication division,
Twentieth Television.
MyNetworkTV was created to give UPN and WB stations, not mentioned as becoming CW affiliates, another option besides becoming independent. It was also created to compete against The CW.
It was announced that WEWB would become the market's
CW after owner Tribune signed a 10 year affiliation deal with the new network on most of its WB stations. On
March 9, 2006, it was announced that WNYA would become an affiliate of MyNetworkTV. WNYA would begin airing ads for the new network and put banner ads on their website in
June.
On
July 30, WNYA's web address became a promotional website for the new network. There was no information about the station and its programming. On
August 2, a new website was shown with a new MyNetworkTV logo. With UPN affiliation, the station's logo didn't include a channel number in it. The MyNetworkTV logo is based on cable-only WEDG-TV's channel 4 position on Time Warner Cable systems. Ironically, nowhere in
Berkshire County is WNYA currently on channel 4. In
North Adams, channel 4 is the spot where Boston's CBS affiliate
WBZ-TV is located.
Despite its MyNetworkTV affiliation (which took effect on-air on
September 5), WNYA aired the last two weeks of UPN programming. However, it was aired in late nights from 1 to 3 A.M. from Tuesday to Saturday.
WEWB (now WCWN) began broadcasting The CW on
September 18.
On April 18, 2008 WNYA launched its HD channel on Time Warner Cable in Albany despite being unable to broadcast HD over the air. This coincides with the first Yankee broadcast they've the rights to.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Wnya'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://wnya.totallyexplained.com">WNYA Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
