TV Stations in Detroit

**noggin** · June-24-11, 05:18 PM

Even though all the TV stations have Detroit attached to their name, only WDIV Channel 4 has their studio in Detroit. Does anyone out there resent their spreading this falsehood?

**Ray1936** · June-24-11, 05:21 PM

All TV stations in the US do that, noggin. Only one of the TV stations in Las Vegas are IN Las Vegas. The others are in Clark county [[unincorporated) and Henderson. Don't bother us none at all. And the transmitting towers are all up on Black Mountain in Henderson. Ditto for radio.

**MikeM** · June-25-11, 12:32 AM

The local stations' city of license is Detroit; they are required by law to identify their city of license along with their call sign.

**Lowell** · June-25-11, 12:48 AM

Divisive thinking leads nowhere but down. The word Detroit refers to the waterway that flows through our family of communities. No one owns the name. Television waves have no borders.

**Vic_doucette** · June-25-11, 05:05 PM

The FCC assigns each broadcast station a unique set of call letters [[sometimes called a call sign) and a city of license -- the city the station's programming is supposed to serve.

Once an hour, a station is legally required to identify itself by mentioning its call letters and city of license, adjacent to each other, like so: "WXXX, Detroit," or "Detroit, WXXX."

WXYZ-TV is licensed to serve Detroit. And as long as the station puts a certain minimum level of signal over the city it is licensed to serve, the FCC doesn't care where the studios or transmitter is located.

There are other issues as well. First of all, it takes a great deal of land to put up a broadcast tower. Fos the sake of this discussion, let's assume you want to put up a tower that is 1,000 feet high. [[The antennas for channels 2, 4 and 7 are all within a few feet of 1,000 feet tall.) What you don't see as you pass by the antenna is the series of copper radials buried in the ground, like spokes radiating from a hub, that are as long as the tower is tall. This means you will need a plot of land that can contain a circle at least 2,000 feet across.

At the time most these facilities were built -- late 1950s to early 1960s -- a piece of land that size in the city proper would likely been prohibitively expensive, assuming you could get zoning approval and FCC approval as well to build there. [[You can't legally put up a tower just any old place -- the Federal Communications Commission has to OK the site.)

Land in the suburbs, on the other hand, was plentiful and cheap. That's a major reason why Southfield/Oak Park and environs have so many towers.

There's another reason they were constructed out that way. Demographic studies run in the late '50s/early '60s correctly predicted that the region's population center would move to the north and west. If you wanted to be able to reach the population a generation down the road, you'd have to anticipate where they would be and locate your transmitter appropriately. Those sites broadcast to a lot of cows on pasture land when they were first built, but they now serve the metropolitan area well.

**Hardhat** · June-25-11, 06:01 PM

Nicely done Vic. Good stuff.

lilpup · June-25-11, 06:11 PM

tho' certain members of the WXYZ team display a definite conservative and anti-Detroit bias

**milesdriven** · June-25-11, 07:10 PM

My monstrosity of an antenna allows me to enjoy all the Detroit and Windsor stations down in Toledo, as well as Flint and Lansing when atmospheric conditions are right.

**Jimaz** · June-25-11, 07:12 PM

Originally Posted by Vic_doucette

... What you don't see as you pass by the antenna is the series of copper radials buried in the ground, like spokes radiating from a hub, that are as long as the tower is tall. This means you will need a plot of land that can contain a circle at least 2,000 feet across....

Excellent point. This is why CB antennas are best placed in the center of a car's roof. It uses the metallic roof itself as a ground plane. There's also the issue of real estate needed for antenna guy wires.

Of course today the studios can be located anywhere. You just need to get the signal from there to the transmitter by any means necessary.

In Phoenix there's an impressive antenna farm on top of South Mountain. Their shadows only hint at what the Streetview shows. The higher the antenna, the broader its range. Real estate is at a premium on South Mountain.

Note that the call letters begin with "K" instead of "W" west of the Mississippi, generally.

**313WX** · June-25-11, 07:59 PM

Originally Posted by lilpup

tho' certain members of the WXYZ team display a definite conservative and anti-Detroit bias

Really? I thought that was more obvious at WJBK.

It's obvious by their newcasts as they broadcasting every negative thing about the city proper every other minute.

lilpup · June-25-11, 08:25 PM

Obvious is one thing, insidious is another.

**Roq** · June-25-11, 08:47 PM

Originally Posted by noggin

Even though all the TV stations have Detroit attached to their name, only WDIV Channel 4 has their studio in Detroit. Does anyone out there resent their spreading this falsehood?

Resent? No. Mildly disappointed? Yeah.

**RaumVogel** · June-25-11, 09:25 PM

I now live in Pennsylvania. I tell everyone I'm originally from Detroit. Actually, I was raised in the burbs.

thatguy123 · June-25-11, 11:29 PM

Originally Posted by Roq

Resent? No. Mildly disappointed? Yeah.

Because where the show you are watching comes from matters. People need to get over this "It HAS to be in Detroit" bs. You are the reason the Detroit area is as crappy as it is

**Roq** · June-26-11, 01:02 AM

Originally Posted by thatguy123

Because where the show you are watching comes from matters. People need to get over this "It HAS to be in Detroit" bs. You are the reason the Detroit area is as crappy as it is

I'm flattered the whole metro regions decline is solely because of me.

**gnome** · June-26-11, 02:01 PM

Wow, Roq I knew you carried some influence, but had no idea you were the cause of our collective inability to operate Head Start programs, keep the street lights working, arrest killers, wear condoms, nor select tasteful colors for our party stores.

I want to party with you.

**CLAUDE G** · June-27-11, 01:13 AM

Originally Posted by Vic_doucette

There's another reason they were constructed out that way. Demographic studies run in the late '50s/early '60s correctly predicted that the region's population center would move to the north and west. If you wanted to be able to reach the population a generation down the road, you'd have to anticipate where they would be and locate your transmitter appropriately. Those sites broadcast to a lot of cows on pasture land when they were first built, but they now serve the metropolitan area well.

Thats actually the main reason why the broadcast towers are located in southfield.

Ideally, you would normally see the towers on a tall building downtown but the main issue with doing that is that 1/2 your signal goes into Canada. By locating in Southfield, you get the signal further west of the city and are still able to serve the entire city.

It does not do any good to broadcast a signal into Canada, especially from an advertising point of view because local advertisers are not going to want to pay to advertise in Canada.

**Roq** · June-27-11, 03:59 AM

Originally Posted by gnome

Wow, Roq I knew you carried some influence, but had no idea you were the cause of our collective inability to operate Head Start programs, keep the street lights working, arrest killers, wear condoms, nor select tasteful colors for our party stores.

I want to party with you.

Sure Gnome, we can finish ruining whatever is left of the metro area that I haven't gotten to already.

**stromberg2** · June-27-11, 03:18 PM

Way to go, Roq! I knew you had it in you!

Stromberg2

**jerrytimes** · June-28-11, 05:01 PM

Originally Posted by Roq

I'm flattered the whole metro regions decline is solely because of me.

You're pretty powerful I guess. Anyway, I couldn't care less that the stations aren't in the city. The are in the Detroit Metropolitan area and that's all the matters. There were reasons years ago as to why they left and possibly some day, if Detroit rebounds, maybe they will come back. This is the least of Detroits problems though. What people should really be mad at is why is GM opening more plants in MEXICO? They want us to buy their product and to be American, but all their newer plants are in Mexico and Ontario. What about Detroit GM? This also leads to the question, what is Detroit doing to get plants into the city? Anything?

**313WX** · June-28-11, 05:21 PM

Originally Posted by jerrytimes

There were reasons years ago as to why they left and possibly some day, if Detroit rebounds, maybe they will come back.

FYI, majority of the stations had alerady moved out of Detroit before it really began to decline.

**English** · June-28-11, 07:07 PM

Originally Posted by CLAUDE G

Thats actually the main reason why the broadcast towers are located in southfield.

Ideally, you would normally see the towers on a tall building downtown but the main issue with doing that is that 1/2 your signal goes into Canada. By locating in Southfield, you get the signal further west of the city and are still able to serve the entire city.

It does not do any good to broadcast a signal into Canada, especially from an advertising point of view because local advertisers are not going to want to pay to advertise in Canada.

This makes a ton of sense. Not everything has to be within city limits.