BBC North West Tonight coverage of Cumbria

Almost anything is possible as far as specially tailored services for any geographical area you like, with delivery via satellite or 'on line', all it requires is (non existent) money to be spent ! Terrestrial coverage will always be constrained by topological features.

The Beeb are cash strapped, and the technical facilities in most of the English regions are so shagged out, it's an embarrassment. It ain't going to happen.

And remember that they did have plans for localised (County-wide) services back in the early 2000s - online and red button video services, and they were trialled for a while in the West Midlands.

However they got abandoned because of competition concerns and now even the local news pages in their website have been reduced to a regional live blog.

Of course the local commercial media stepped up to the plate and provide... no most of the local newspapers have closed or been delocalised

Suspect the BBC Local service would have cost less than what was siphoned off to Local TV too.

Cumbria poorly served by the BBC? So that's why they have a local radio station which covers the whole county, even the south which is in the NWT region.

ITV's Lookaround programme while only one opt these days still superserves Cumbria in addition to Dumfries & Galloway and the Borders, while the pisspoor That's Cumbria serves Carlisle.

The Look North Newcastle solution, while not perfect ensures that Cumbrian news has a chance of reaching the running order unlike NWT where stories from Manchester, Liverpool and Preston which generate more news have a better chance of getting on the bulletin.

What's the reason for the Granada area only having one transmittor?

All good points, and you have to ask how much more coverage does it need than any other mainly rural county? Lookaround, even when it was based in Carlisle must have struggled a lot of nights.


And yes, you have to remember local radio, stations like Radio Cumbria serve their counties very well and are deservedly very popular. The BBC recently announced increased funding for them.

Relatively speaking the BBC is now less well-resourced in the English regions than it was in the 80s. Fewer production / technical staff, lower-quality kit (compared to Network production) etc., coupled with expectations of higher production values. What constituted an acceptable service in the 80s wouldn't be acceptable now. (See the Channel Islands opts)

Because it only needs one to cover its area

That's why the main transmitters are located where they are - to cover the whole country with as few as possible. The various regional services over the years were created according to transmitter service area, not the other way round

Because it only needs one. Transmitters are sited to cover the whole of the country as efficiently as possible (only using as many as are required) - not to make nice neat local news regions. The ITV regional franchise structure was based around transmitter coverage - not the other way round, and the same goes for BBC regional news areas.

Because only one is necessary to ensure coverage.

Because only one is required to serve their area. Not sure if we've gotten the point across enough, maybe someone else could post about this?