BBC Television Centre

Not sure what common sense had to do with it - I suspect there were no decent deals for the studio operation... Well none that would preserve pensions for BBC Studios staff AND not require the BBC to sign a large chunk of money away to cover asbestos liabilities. That and no guarantee of a lease after Sport, Kids and News move out...

If an offer that was acceptable had been made - the operation would have been sold. The only assumption to be made is that BBC Studios is not really a commercially viable operation in its current form, and the Beeb have decided that it is more cost effective to keep it in house - allowing them to close it if they want to sell off the sites at TV Centre and/or Elstree at some future point?


No - BBC News (and I think BBC Audio and Music - i.e. BBC Radio OB trucks) units are not part of this deal.

OBs don't operate the BBC News fleet - though historically they've shared servicing and some maintenance - though now that BBC OBs are in Langley and not Acton this may have ceased.



There are lots of other news truck providers. The BBC lease trucks from Globecast (was Newsforce aka Newsfarce) and Arqiva have quite a few as well I believe, as well as Neon.

SISLink may have the big ITN/Sky deals - but there are other operators out there still.

As for the Blue and White - I'm old enough to remember the Green livery... The Blue has never said BBC to me...

Which studio is being converted to HD?

Not sure - suspect 3,4 or 6 - which are all roughly the same size as 8 (which is already HD, along with TC1).

TC8 is game show/sitcom friendly because it has audience seating. TC6 was revamped in the 90s to move the gallery to the ground floor to allow for quicker access for drama/sit com - but this didn't actually prove too popular and it became the home of saturday kids shows. TC3 has a better sound area than most TVC studios and was the home for TOTP, and TC4 was a popular studio for BP.

TC2/5/7 are smaller and are all on permanent lease to the kids, sport and news I think. The news studio has recently been upgraded with new SD cameras and a new VM (which could be HD if re-configured) - but I doubt 2/5/7 will be HD anytime soon. TC5 has an HD path via an HD sub-mixer that can be used to switch between an incoming HD feed and upconverted SD studio already and I suspect any major investment is unlikely as Sport are leaving in a few years?

TC3 was out of service for asbestos reasons so it may be they are upgrading that to HD whilst this takes place? Just a guess to be honest.

It's a shame they can't make the studios bigger. I remember years ago that they were going to knock 7 and 8 into one studio. But that won't happen now because 7 is used for news programmes.

I don't think there's the need for bigger studios at TC, not least because larger studios are available from other suppliers. TC1 sits empty often enough as it is and is frankly as big as the BBC needs for most major things (Children in Need/ Big entertainment stuff like Eurovision Dance Contest, Strictly Come Dancing etc).

Anyway, roughly speaking, the studios are arranged big/small/big/small etc. It would make a very odd shaped studio to knock (as was suggested) TC7 and 8 together.

Not a huge call for large studios outside the major Saturday night shows (TC1, TLS Studio 1 and Fountain at Wembley kind of cover those)- in fact splitting existing large studios into two smaller ones might be a smart move. ISTR that TC6 was conceived to work like this when first built - and TC5 used to be splittable (as it has two galleries) but the current set is too big.

The original plans for TC9 - which was due to be a replacement for the BBC TV Theatre (aka the Shepherds Bush Empire) - in what is now the News Centre would have created a very nice large audience show venue which would compete with TC1 and TLS Studio 1- particularly as TC1 isn't that audience seating friendly in layout terms.

Yep - the small studios fit in the gaps between the big studios - which makes a good use of space.

Rule of thumb is that 2, 5 and 7 are roughly the same and 3,4,6 and 8 are roughly the same. 10 and 11 are much smaller and on the 6th floor - with 11 being usefully bigger than 10.

Apparently it is TC4 that is being upgraded to HD over the summer this year - giving them three HD studios at TVC.

What about the two tone grey!

Just about I think... First sat in a scanner in 1977.

It was released by the BBC this month that the BBC Outside Broadcast services has a bid from SIS. The company offered a good deal to the BBC and it looks like it will be accepted.

However thy have said the corporation will be keeping control of the studio business "The Studios business will be retained by the Corporation".

Does this mean that TV Centre will be held on by the BBC while control of OB, Costumes, & Post Productions will be sold off.

I have been trying to go through what is happening with TV Centre but it seems the BBC are being abit unwilling to say what will defintley be happening.

I have visited Television Centre and it would be a shame if the building would be demolished, as some are saying in websites.

Just a random bit of information, but Fountain is actually 2 small studios with a movable wall splitting them, which is removed to make one big studio for X Factor / Britain's Got Talent / Grease Is The Word etc.