The Newsroom

ITV wants to axe some regional news services

From 17 to 9 (September 2007)

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RB
RB
nwtv2003 posted:

I can't see why they can't give Cumbria and the IOM to Granada, Granada often mention Cumbria anyway, but I don't know who people in Cumbria think, so by this I mean would people in Cumbria prefer to recieve their Regional News from Manchester or Newcastle/ Gateshead?


When the BBC switched Cumbria from the North East to the North West back in the 80s there was uproar. The News and Star in Carlisle campaigned to get Mike Neville back. It won, eventually. I think people in north Cumbria (at least) identify with the North East more than Greater Manchester and Merseyside.

South Cumbria, including Barrow in Furness, watches the signal from Winter Hill, so they get Granada, BBC NW.

The Isle of Man would be more likely to move to Granada, though. Isle of Man Newspapers has been reporting on that suggestion. The BBC goes to great lengths (see posts passim) to give the island North West rather than NE and C.
RB
RB
jason posted:
RB posted:
EmleyMoor posted:
[

Take the recent example of the regional assembly vote in the north east - how did most people know about it? Through the coverage on BBC Look North and Tyne Tees.
The combined audience of both each night is roughly 400,000 viewers - way more than audiences for local radio and papers.

.


In fact, daily and weekly newspapers' combined readerships is far more than regional television viewership. Add radio to that and they dwarf the regional tv news figures.

These are the audited circulation figures for the big North East dailies.

Northern Echo circulation 51,639
Newcastle Evening Chronicle 80,669
The Journal, Newcastle 33,614
Evening Gazette, Teesside 52,491
Sunderland Echo 43,532

Of course, these are circulations. Multiply by more than 2 for readerships.

Add weeklies, including free weeklies (which are really the newspaper equivalent of ITV, free at the point of use, news paid for by advertisements) and you'll have a much bigger total. OK, a lot of local weekly papers' quality varies. But they're still a very potent force.

For example, East Cleveland Herald and Post alone has a circulation of 49,341. Add all the weekly papers of Tyneside, Northumberland, Wearside, Teesside, North Yorkshire and Durham together and they have a much bigger reach than ITV or BBC regional news.


I'm not sure what your point is here.

National newspapers achieve much higher collective circulation than national news programmes in the same way (in truth the ratings for national news programmes are comparable to the local programmes themselves).

If you are suggesting that this is justification to can local news, then surely it is reason enough to get rid of the national news as well?

BTW you're not the same RB from over at NotBBC are you? Smile


My point was to point out that the assertion (in the bit I quoted) that local television news gets more audience than local newspapers and radio combined was far off the mark.

Indeed on the NotBBC thing.
SE
seamus
To better explain what I was talking about:


http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/4892/itvnrtk5.jpg

Not sure if it is possible.
SO
Steven O
RB posted:
nwtv2003 posted:

I can't see why they can't give Cumbria and the IOM to Granada, Granada often mention Cumbria anyway, but I don't know who people in Cumbria think, so by this I mean would people in Cumbria prefer to recieve their Regional News from Manchester or Newcastle/ Gateshead?


When the BBC switched Cumbria from the North East to the North West back in the 80s there was uproar. The News and Star in Carlisle campaigned to get Mike Neville back. It won, eventually. I think people in north Cumbria (at least) identify with the North East more than Greater Manchester and Merseyside.

South Cumbria, including Barrow in Furness, watches the signal from Winter Hill, so they get Granada, BBC NW.



The relays in the South Lakes (Kendal, Coniston, Hawkshead and Windermere areas) get Border and BBC NW - they originally transmitted Granada, but were changed over in the early 80s to relay Border.

Another transmitter, at Haltwhistle, had its BBC feed changed from Caldbeck to Pontop Pike following complaints from locals, soon after Cumbria became part of the BBC North West region.
TE
TELEVISION
I wish people would stop assuming that the south of Scotland would happily go with STV, and Cumbria with TyneTees. I mean ITV may be trying to save money, but I would have Border over STV anyday.
:-(
A former member
seamus21514 posted:
To better explain what I was talking about:


http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/4892/itvnrtk5.jpg

Not sure if it is possible.


doesn't the whole of Cumbria get served by one transmitter for borders?

also I dare say the SNP government will complain about this! there may end up getting STV

but could it al be possible after the switch over?
SO
Steven O
623058 posted:
seamus21514 posted:
To better explain what I was talking about:


http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/4892/itvnrtk5.jpg

Not sure if it is possible.


doesn't the whole of Cumbria get served by one transmitter for borders?


No, because of the geography of the area. TV signals cannot penetrate mountains!

North and mid-Cumbria are served by Caldbeck and its relays, and so they get ITV1 Border and BBC NE&C.

The ones in the south of the county are fed by Winter Hill, which relays ITV1 Granada and BBC NW.

The masts in the South Lakes, serving Kendal, Hawkshead, Windermere and Coniston, which are relays of Winter Hill, were reallocated from Granada to Border at the beginning of 1982 - so they broadcast ITV1 Border and BBC NW.

And the Isle of Man relays get their feed from Caldbeck (all channels) but get their BBC news service fed from Winter Hill.

Hope this clears things up.
SE
seamus
So that would be technically possible? I think the major changes will be with Border, and West merging into Westcountry.
:-(
A former member
seamus21514 posted:
So that would be technically possible? I think the major changes will be with Border, and West merging into Westcountry.


there so do a 3 way slip of West!
SO
Steven O
TELEVISION posted:
I wish people would stop assuming that the south of Scotland would happily go with STV, and Cumbria with TyneTees. I mean ITV may be trying to save money, but I would have Border over STV anyday.


And presumably you'd be happy, too, to miss out on programmes being shown in the rest of Scotland?
NE
nezza
What i've realised when reading the last few posts is the sheer passion of the the forum users. Living in Yorkshire I wouldn't be affected to severely by the changes in fact if the two outputs (leeds and hull) were remerged it might make Calendar better.

I suggest that instead talking to each other one or most users make an appeal to ofcom. Explain how strongly you feel and see what happens.

I know it's a long shot and it might not work e.g News At Ten but if no-one says anything then OFCOM will do ITV's bidding and we will lose out again.
ST
Stuart
I certainly don't want ITV West & Westcountry to merge. The facilities in Bristol are probably far better than the meagre offerings on Langage Science Park in Plympton, so no doubt that's where it would be based.

I'm sure they would initially try to cover the whole region and continue with the sub-regional opts, but I couldn't see that lasting for financial reasons. The area would be too large and diverse to cover.

I don't know why ITV don't just admit they can't afford to meet their obligations and hand back the licences to Ofcom. They could still broadcast on DCab and DSat as a single network even if they lost their privileged DTT allocation. They would also save shed-loads of money on multiple DSat feeds and think of the income from selling all those regional facilities.

Leave regional TV to the BBC, they sem to be better at it anyway.

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