ITV London

Perhaps this is a stupid question, but can somebody tell me why it is that London have 2 ITV franchises, the weekday and weekend one. Does it date back to the very start of ITV, and why do London need 2 franchises. Also, would it be possible for the same company to apply for both franchises, or is their something in the rules about this ? I guess London viewers are very lucky because they get more sets of idents than the rest of the regions. I know that LWT & Carlton have collaborated to create LNN for the News, but what about the rest of the presentation, I've never really seen much of London ITV. Also, at what time do the stations hand over and hand back, do they use different continuity announcers etc.

I Like 2 franchises in London becuase then we don't have 2 suffer 7 days of Carlton just 4 1/2 days of Carlton

I think LWT comes on air at 5.05pm on a Friday (but you don't see the ident until 5.30pm, because CITV continuity is used) and goes off air at 6am on Monday morning. Carlton however, doesn't come on air until 9.25am on a Monday, because of GMTV. Carlton effectively goes off air at 3.20pm on Friday, because of CITV. So there you have it! And I see your point about Carlton. Bring back Central and Westcountry!

Yes, but it was 2 different companies originally (ABC and Rediffusion, who became Thames in 1968).
No. Carlton and LWT's franchises will never be held by one company. Not unless they nationalise ITV, and that's unlikely, as UTV and Channel's owners would only get a small stake.

Originally it was Granada (weekdays) and ABC (weekends) in the North, ATV (weekdays) and ABC (weekends) in the Midlands and Associated Rediffusion (weekdays) and ATV (weekends) in London.

It was believed that the regions were too large to be held by single contractors, so to add competition for advertising revenue they were split in the 5 day - 2 day manner. Also, there were no Friday afternoon changeovers - the weekend broadcasters only operated Saturday morning to Sunday night.

More information at http://www.itw.org.uk/

(Edited by Andrew Wood at 7:22 pm on June 11, 2001)

Its possible that Carlton could purchase LWT's franchise at the next franchise battle, although the chances of it happening a very little.

Just like say Granada out bidding Carlton London.

In case you're interested:

• 22 Sep 1955 - ITV London starts: A-R on weedays and - after a name change from Associated Broadcasting Company (ABC) - Associated TeleVision (ATV) at weekends.
  
• 17 Feb 1956 - ITV Mids starts (with the arrangement Andrew says above)
  
• 3 May 1956 - ITV in the North starts
  
• 31 Aug 1957 - ITV Central Scotland launches
  

I could go on forever. If you want any more let me know. Other points of interest in the story:

• 6 April 1964 - Associated Rediffusion renamed Rediffusion
  
• 28 July 1968 - ABC ceases in the midlands, ATV becomes 7 day service
  
• 29 July 1968 - Rediffusion transmissions cease. The station merges with ABC to become Thames, broadcasting weekdays in London.
  
• 2 Aug 1968 - LWT starts
  
• 31 Dec 1981 - ATV ceases, Central starts
  
• 31 Dec 1992 - many franchise changes, including Carlton starting in London, replacing Thames, and GMTV starts
  

And I'm not typing any more!

Well,in Thames days,as late as 1992,they used to sign off,eg (Well that's it for Thames this week,we will be back on Monday,but now it's LWT)

But they don't anymore,I wonder when they stopped this?



Ah,but they don't link in to CITV,do they?

Orignally most regions had 2 stations serving them, however as the need died out for another station taking over at the weekend services were scaled down.
This did of course lead to ABC - 'Your Weekend Television in the North' - my mother is sadly old enough to remember that being said on every ABC ident in the North, losing every one of its franchises.

I think the idea behind keeping them now has two arguements.
the first of which is to prevent one company taking all of the ad. revenue from the London region.
And of course no government would ever see the demise of LWT, they saw what happened to Thames and to be honest the likelyhood of it ever happening to LWT is virtually nil.

Like GMTV, CITV has control of it's time slot, not the regions. Once the ident goes off when CITV comes on on a Friday, Carlton London is gone until 9.25am Monday.

I still want only One ITV.

All idents have ITV on it and when regional programmes come on you get ITV North or ITV London etc.

Having different channel names is stupid i have always called it ITV plus with all these over itv channels launching, it would make more sense!

Free ITV One!

Though CITV is totally unlike GMTV in that CITV is a 'strand' within ITV's programming, whereas GMTV is a completey separate entity from ITV - being a Channel 3 national license holder in its own right.

But that's beside the point as we all know that anyway!

(Edited by Andrew Wood at 4:31 pm on June 19, 2001)