Digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television is a technological evolution of broadcast television and an advancement over analog television. A terrestrial implementation of digital television uses a aerial to broadcast to a conventional television antenna instead of a satellite dish or cable television connection. The amount of data that can be transmitted is directly affected by channel capacity, the modulation method in DVB-T is COFDM with either 64 or 16-state Quadrature Amplitude Modulation. In general, a 64QAM channel is capable of transmitting a bit rate. 16 and 64QAM constellations can be combined in a single multiplex, the DVB-T standard is not used for terrestrial digital television in North America. Instead, the ATSC standard calls for 8VSB modulation, which has similar characteristics to the vestigial sideband modulation used for analog television. This provides considerably more immunity to interference, but is not immune — as DVB-T is — to multipath distortion, both systems use the MPEG transport stream and H.
262/MPEG-2 Part 2 video codec specified in MPEG-2, they differ significantly in how related services are encoded. DTTV is received either via a digital set-top box, TV gateway or integrated tuner included with television sets, some set-top-boxes and TV gateways include digital video recorder functionality. This is quite common in the UK, see external links, indoor aerials are even more likely to be affected by these issues and possibly need replacing. Main articles, List of digital television deployments by country, Digital television transition Afghanistan started digital transmissions in MPEG-4 on Sunday,31 August 2014, Afghanistan adopted DVB-T2 system for digital television. India adopted DVB-T system for television in July 1999. The first DVB-T transmission was started on 26 January 2003 in the four metropolitan cities by Doordarshan. Currently the terrestrial transmission is available in digital and analog formats. 4 high power DVB-T transmitters were set up in the top 4 cities, an additional 190 high power, and 400 low power DVB-T2 transmitters have been approved for Tier I, II and III cities of the country by 2017.
The Indian telecom regulator, TRAI, had recommended the I&B to allow private broadcast companies to use the DTT technology, so far, the Indian I&B ministry only permits private broadcast companies to use satellite, cable and IPTV based systems. Israel started digital transmissions in MPEG-4 on Sunday,2 August 2009, Israel was the first nation in the Middle East and the first non-European nation to shut down its analogue TV distribution system. The new service which is operated by the Second Authority for Radio, according to government decisions, the system will expand to include two additional multiplexes that will carry new channels and HD versions of the existing channels. In this matter nothing has been decided upon until the end on 2012, on 20 March 2013 it was announced that Thomson Broadcast had won a major contract with The Second Authority for Television and Radio for the extension of its nationwide DVB-T/DVB-T2 network
Digital audio broadcasting
Digital audio broadcasting is a digital radio standard for broadcasting digital audio radio services, used in several countries across Europe and Asia Pacific. The DAB standard was initiated as a European research project in the 1980s, the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation launched the first DAB channel in the world on 1 June 1995, and the BBC and Swedish Radio launched their first DAB digital radio broadcasts in September 1995. DAB receivers have been available in many countries since the end of the 1990s, DAB may offer more radio programmes over a specific spectrum than analogue FM radio. Audio quality varies depending on the used and audio material. Most stations use a bit rate of 128 kbit/s or less with the MP2 audio codec, which requires 160 kbit/s to achieve perceived FM quality. 128 kbit/s gives better dynamic range or signal-to-noise ratio than FM radio, but a more smeared stereo image, however, CD quality sound with MP2 is possible with 256…192 kbps. An upgraded version of the system was released in February 2007, DAB is not forward compatible with DAB+, which means that DAB-only receivers are not able to receive DAB+ broadcasts.
However, broadcasters can mix DAB and DAB+ programs inside the same transmission, DAB+ is approximately twice as efficient as DAB, and more robust. In spectrum management, the bands that are allocated for public DAB services, are abbreviated with T-DAB, where the T stands for terrestrial. More than 30 countries provide DAB transmissions, and several countries, such as Norway, UK, Italy, Switzerland, The Netherlands, in many countries it is expected that DAB will gradually replace FM radio. Norway was the first country to announce national FM radio analog switchoff starting from 2017, DAB has been under development since 1981 at the Institut für Rundfunktechnik. In 1985 the first DAB demonstrations were held at the WARC-ORB in Geneva, DAB was developed as a research project for the European Union, which started in 1987 on initiative by a consortium formed in 1986. The MPEG-1 Audio Layer II codec was created as part of the EU147 project, a choice of audio codec and error-correction coding schemes and first trial broadcasts were made in 1990.
Public demonstrations were made in 1993 in the United Kingdom, the protocol specification was finalized in 1993 and adopted by the ITU-R standardization body in 1994, the European community in 1995 and by ETSI in 1997. Pilot broadcasts were launched in countries in 1995. The UK was the first country to receive a range of radio stations via DAB. Commercial DAB receivers began to be sold in 1999 and over 50 commercial, the standard was coordinated by the European DAB forum, formed in 1995 and reconstituted to the World DAB Forum in 1997, which represents more than 30 countries. In 2006 the World DAB Forum became the World DMB Forum which now presides over both the DAB and DMB standard, in October 2005, the World DMB Forum instructed its Technical Committee to carry out the work needed to adopt the AAC+ audio codec and stronger error correction coding
London Borough of Bromley
The London Borough of Bromley /ˈbrɒmli/ is one of the 32 London boroughs which make up Greater London. The London Borough of Bromley is south of the River Thames which flows through London, the borough is named after Bromley, its principal town. The local authority is Bromley London Borough Council, the borough is the largest in Greater London by area and occupies 59 square miles, of which the majority is Metropolitan Green Belt land. It is perhaps the most rural, most of the population lives in the north and west of the borough, with an outlier at Biggin Hill in the far south. The borough shares borders with the London Boroughs of Lewisham and Greenwich to the North, Bexley to the North East and Lambeth to the North West, as well as Croydon to the West. It borders the Sevenoaks District of Kent to the East and South, westerham Heights, the highest point in London at an altitude of 804 feet, is located on the southern boundary. The Prime Meridian passes through Bromley, about 30% of the land in Bromley is farmland, the highest figure of a London Borough.
The borough was formed, as were all other London boroughs, in 1969, after a local campaign, the village of Knockholt was transferred back to Kent to become part of the Sevenoaks Rural District and Sevenoaks District. Before 1965 it had part of the Orpington Urban District. The borough is partly urban and partly rural, the former to the north, other smaller suburban areas include Anerley and nearby Crystal Palace, and Penge. In addition, parts of Mottingham, Sydenham and Ruxley lie within the borough boundaries, there are two main built-up areas in the southern part of the borough and West Wickham. Biggin Hill and Keston with Leaves Green and Nash are separate, local attractions include Down House, Chislehurst Caves, Holwood House, Crofton Roman Villa, and the site of The Crystal Palace. Bromley is divided into 22 wards with a total of 60 council seats, after a number of by-elections and a defection, the Conservatives regained control on 5 July 2001. The 22 wards are shown on the accompanying map, ward names often straddle the named settlements and suburban areas above, their boundaries are fixed, whereas the latter are not.
In 1801, the parishes that form the modern borough had a total population of 8,944. This rose slowly throughout the 19th century, as the district built up. When the railways arrived the rate of growth increased. The population peaked in the 1970s, when began to relocate from London
Effective radiated power
Effective radiated power, synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency power transmitted from a theoretical half-wave dipole antenna. It is differentiated from effective isotropic radiated power mainly by use of antenna gain instead of absolute gain in the calculation. The term antenna gain is assumed to be absolute unless specifically stated to be relative, the gain is multiplied by the power actually accepted by the antenna to result in the actual ERP value. Power losses which occur prior to the antenna, e. g. in the line or from inefficiency in the generator itself are therefore not included in the calculation of ERP or EIRP. Antenna gain is closely related to directivity and often used interchangeably. However, gain is less than directivity by a factor called radiation efficiency. Whereas directivity is entirely a function of wavelength and the geometry and type of antenna, accelerating charge causes electromagnetic radiation per Maxwells equations.
Therefore, antennas use a current distribution on radiating elements to generate electromagnetic energy that propagates away from the antenna and this coupling is never 100% efficient, and therefore antenna gain will always be less than directivity by this efficiency factor. The receiver would not be able to determine a difference, maximum directivity of an ideal half-wave dipole is a constant, i. e.0 dBd =2.15 dBi. Therefore, ERP is always 2.15 dB less than EIRP, the ideal dipole antenna could be further replaced by an isotropic radiator, and the receiver cannot know the difference so long as the input power is increased by 2.15 dB. Unfortunately, the distinction between dBd and dBi is often left unstated and the reader is forced to infer which was used. For example, a Yagi-Uda antenna is constructed from several dipoles arranged at intervals to create better energy focusing than a simple dipole. Since it is constructed from dipoles, often its antenna gain is expressed in dBd, obviously this ambiguity is undesirable with respect to engineering specifications.
A Yagi-Uda antennas maximum directivity is 8.77 dBd =10.92 dBi and its gain necessarily must be less than this by the factor η, which must be negative in units of dB. Neither ERP nor EIRP can be calculated without knowledge of the power accepted by the antenna, let us assume a 100 Watt transmitter with losses of 6 dB prior to the antenna. ERP <22. 77dBW and EIRP <24. 92dBW, polarization has not been taken into account so far, but properly it must be. When considering the dipole radiator previously we assumed that it was aligned with the receiver. Now assume, that the antenna is circularly polarized
DVB-T2
DVB has been standardized by ETSI. This system transmits compressed digital audio and other data in physical layer pipes, the higher offered bit rate, with respect to its predecessor DVB-T, makes it a system suited for carrying HDTV signals on the terrestrial TV channel. As of 2014, it was implemented in broadcasts in the United Kingdom, Finland, Sweden, Thailand Flanders, Ukraine, Denmark, Romania, in March 2006 DVB decided to study options for an upgraded DVB-T standard. The novel system should provide a minimum 30% increase in payload, the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 agreed with the regulator Ofcom to convert one UK multiplex to DVB-T2 to increase capacity for HDTV via DTT. They expected the first TV region to use the new standard would be Granada in November 2009 and it was expected that over time there would be enough DVB-T2 receivers sold to switch all DTT transmissions to DVB-T2, and H.264. Ofcom published its decision on 3 April 2008, for HDTV using DVB-T2 and H.264. ITV and C4 had, as expected, applied to Ofcom for the 2 additional HD slots available from 2009 to 2012.
Ofcom indicated that it found a channel covering 3.7 million households in London. Ofcom indicated that they would look for more unused UHF channels in other parts of the UK, the DVB-T2 draft standard was ratified by the DVB Steering Board on 26 June 2008, and published on the DVB homepage as DVB-T2 standard BlueBook. It was handed over to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute by DVB. ORG on 20 June 2008, the ETSI process resulted in the DVB-T2 standard being adopted on 9 September 2009. The ETSI process had several phases, but the changes were text clarifications. Since the DVB-T2 physical layer specification was complete, and there would be no further technical enhancements, a draft PSI/SI specification document was agreed with the DVB-TM-GBS group. Prototype receivers were shown in September IBC2008 and more recent version at the IBC2009 in Amsterdam, as of 2012, Appear TV produce DVB-T2 receivers, DVB-T2 modulators and DVB-T2 gateways. Other companies like ENKOM or IfN develop software based decoding, NORDIG published a DVB-T2 receiver specification and performance requirement on 1 July 2009.
The DTGs test house, DTG Testing are testing Freeview HD products against this specification, many tests broadcast transmission using this standard are being in process in France, with local Gap filler near Rennes CCETT. DVB-T2 was tested in October 2010, in Geneva region, with Mont Salèves repeater, a mobile van was testing BER, and quality reception, with special PCs used as spectrum analysers, constellation testers. The van was moving in Canton Geneva, and France, there were none demonstrated in TELECOM2011 at Palexpo. The following characteristics have been devised for the T2 standard, COFDM modulation with QPSK, 16-QAM, 64-QAM, OFDM modes are 1k, 2k, 4k, 8k, 16k, and 32k
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and Channel Islands. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service and it was renamed BBC TV in 1960, using this name until the launch of sister channel BBC2 in 1964, whereupon the BBC TV channel became known as BBC1, with the current spelling adopted in 1997. The channels annual budget for 2012–13 is £1.14 billion, the channel is funded by the television licence fee together with the BBCs other domestic television stations, and therefore shows uninterrupted programming without commercial advertising. It is currently the most watched channel in the United Kingdom, ahead of its traditional rival for ratings leadership. As of June 2013 the channel controller for BBC One is Charlotte Moore, the BBC began its own regular television programming from the basement of Broadcasting House, London, on 22 August 1932. BBC Television returned on 7 June 1946 at 15,00, Jasmine Bligh, one of the original announcers, made the first announcement, Good afternoon everybody.
Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh, the Mickey Mouse cartoon of 1939 was repeated twenty minutes later. The competition quickly forced the channel to change its identity and priorities following a reduction in its audience. The 1962 Pilkington Report on the future of broadcasting noticed this, and it therefore decided that Britains third television station should be awarded to the BBC. The station, renamed BBC TV in 1960, became BBC1 when BBC2 was launched on 20 April 1964 transmitting an incompatible 625-line image on UHF. The only way to all channels was to use a complex dual-standard 405- and 625-line, VHF and UHF, receiver. Old 405-line-only sets became obsolete in 1985, when transmission in the standard ended, although standards converters have become available for enthusiasts who collect, BBC1 was based at the purpose-built BBC Television Centre at White City, London between 1960 and 2013. In the weeks leading up to 15 November 1969, BBC1 unofficially transmitted the occasional programme in its new colour system, to test it.
At midnight on 15 November, simultaneously with ITV and two years after BBC2, BBC1 officially began 625-line PAL colour programming on UHF with a broadcast of a concert by Petula Clark, colour transmissions could be received on monochrome 625-line sets until the end of analogue broadcasting. In terms of share, the most successful period for BBC1 was under Bryan Cowgill between 1973 and 1977, when the channel achieved an average audience share of 45%. On 30 December 1980, the BBC announced their intention to introduce a new breakfast television service to compete with TV-am. On 17 January 1983, the first edition of Breakfast Time was shown on BBC One, becoming the first UK wide breakfast television service and continued to lead in the rating until 1984. The first major overhaul was to axe the deeply unpopular Sixty Minutes current affairs programme and its replacement was the BBC Six OClock News, a straight new programme in a bid to shore up its failing early evening slot
Winter Hill (North West England)
Winter Hill is a hill on the border of the boroughs of Chorley, Blackburn with Darwen and Bolton, in North West England. It is located on Rivington Moor, Chorley and is 1,496 feet high, part of the West Pennine Moors, it is a popular walking area, and has been the site of mining activity, aeroplane disasters and murders. Its prominent position made it the site for the Winter Hill TV Mast. There are a number of other telecommunication masts and towers around the summit and side of the hill for mobile phones, Professional Mobile Radio users and emergency services. Lancashire Constabulary was the first to use the site for one of their stations in 1950, they had to build the road. Paths to the lead from Belmont & Rivington in Chorley Borough, as well as Horwich. The summit can be reached via a walk from the top of a road pass 1¼ miles west of Belmont. The hill is a feature on the skyline for most of the borough of Chorley. Winter Hills topographic prominence results in it being classified as a Marilyn and it offers views over the Greater Manchester Urban Area, including Manchester city centre, the Civic Centre in Oldham, Werneth Low and Bolton.
On a clear day the summit offers a view of four national parks - The Lake District, Yorkshire Dales, Peak District, the Rivington area contains remains of Lever Park and the private gardens constructed for William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme in which several listed structures remain today. The bare hill top was covered by woodland that may have been destroyed by fire and it is thought that the hill was once inhabited. There is a Bronze Age round cairn dating from 1600–1400 BC on the hill, a stone axe dating from 2500 BC has been found in the area in the River Douglas in Tigers Clough. A flint knife and two arrowheads were discovered, Two burial mounds dating from the Bronze Age are located near the peak. On 24 March 1957, two men discovered curved lines of stones sticking out of the forming a two feet high wall which surrounded a raised area in the middle. In July 1958, a group from the University of Manchester excavated the central only to find it had been excavated 250 years earlier. The site was thought to have originated from 1500 BC in the Middle Bronze Age, the second mound was found higher up the hill on the southern edge of Noon Hill.
The site was excavated in August 1958 by the Bolton & District Archaeological Society, Two memorial cairns on the hill are known as Wilder Lads or Two Lads. There are differing opinions on why they were erected, details of the site were recorded in 1776 and 1883
ITV (TV network)
ITV is a commercial TV network in the United Kingdom. Since the passing of the Broadcasting Act 1990 its legal name has been Channel 3, to distinguish it from the analogue channels at the time, namely BBC1, BBC2. ITV is a network of channels that operate regional television services as well as sharing programmes between each other to be displayed on the entire network. In recent years, several of companies have merged so currently the fifteen franchises are in the hands of two companies. With the exception of Northern Ireland, the ITV brand is the used by ITV plc for the Channel 3 service in these areas. In Northern Ireland, ITV plc uses the brand name UTV, STV Group plc, uses the STV brand for its two franchises of central and northern Scotland. The origins of ITV lie in the passing of the Television Act 1954, the act created the Independent Television Authority to heavily regulate the industry and to award franchises. The first six franchises were awarded in 1954 for London, the Midlands, the first ITV network to launch was Londons Associated-Rediffusion on 22 September 1955, with the Midlands and North services launching in February 1956 and May 1956 respectively.
Following these launches, the ITA awarded more franchises until the country was covered by fourteen regional stations. Following the 1993 changes, ITV as a network began to consolidate with several companies doing so to save money by ceasing the duplication of services present when they were all separate companies. The ITV Network is not owned or operated by one company, since 2016 the fifteen licences are held by two companies, with the majority held by ITV Broadcasting Limited, part of ITV plc. The network is regulated by the media regulator Ofcom who is responsible for awarding the broadcast licences, the last major review of the Channel 3 franchises was in 1991, with all operators licences having been renewed between 1999 and 2002 and again from 2014 without a further contest. However, due to amalgamation of several of companies since the creation of ITV Network Limited. Approved by Ofcom, this results in ITV plc commissioning and funding the network schedule, all licensees have the right to opt out of network programming, however many do not due to pressures from the parent company or because of limited resources.
The network needs to produce accessible output containing subtitles, signing, in exchange for this programming, the ITV network is available on all platforms free to air and can be found at the top of the EPG of all providers. Since the launch of the platform in 1998, all of the ITV licensees have received gifted capacity on the terrestrial television platform. At present, the companies are able to broadcast additional channels and all choose to broadcast the ITV plc owned ITV2, ITV3, ITV4 and CITV in their region. UTV and STV previously broadcast their own services – UTV2 in Northern Ireland and S2 in central and northern Scotland – until 2002, the broadcasters all make use of the Digital 3&4 multiplex, shared with Channel 4
ITV Granada
ITV Granada is the Channel 3 regional service for North West England. The licence for the region has been held by ITV Broadcasting Limited since November 2008 and it is the largest independent television-franchise producing company in the UK, accounting for 25% of the total broadcasting output of the ITV network. It had been held by Granada Television, which was founded by Sidney Bernstein and this was the only surviving company of the original four Independent Television Authority franchisees from 1954, Granada Media Group merged with Carlton Communications to form ITV plc in 2004. It covers Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, northwestern Derbyshire, part of Cumbria, on 15 July 2009, the Isle of Man was transferred to ITV Granada from ITV Border. Broadcasting by Granada Television began on 3 May 1956 under the North of England weekday franchise and it was marked by a distinctive northern identity, and used stylised letter G logo forming an arrow pointing north, often with the tagline Granada, from the north.
Granada plc merged with Carlton Communications to form ITV plc in 2004 after a duopoly had developed over the previous decade, Granada Television Ltd still legally exists. Along with most other companies owned by ITV plc, it is listed on www. companieshouse. gov. uk as a Dormant company. Other companies listed are Granada Television International and Granada Television Overseas Ltd, the North West region is regarded as ITVs most successful franchise. The Financial Times and The Independent once described Granada Television, the franchise holder. Nine Granada programmes were listed in the BFI TV100 in 2000, some of its most notable programmes include Coronation Street, Seven Up. The Royle Family, The Jewel in the Crown, Brideshead Revisited, World in Action, University Challenge, notable employees have included Paul Greengrass, Michael Apted, Mike Newell, Jeremy Isaacs, Andy Harries, Russell T Davies and Leslie Woodhead. Granada Television, a subsidiary of Granada Ltd, originated in Granada Theatres Ltd and it was founded in Dover in 1930 by Sidney Bernstein and his brother Cecil.
The company was incorporated as Granada Ltd in 1934 and listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1935 and it is named after the Spanish city of Granada. Channel 59 from Winter Hill and started broadcasting in colour in the Autumn of 1969, the Bernsteins became involved in commercial television, a competitor to the cinema chains. Bernstein bid for the North of England franchise, which he believed would not affect the companys largely southern-based cinema chain, in 1954, the Independent Television Authority awarded Granada the North of England contract for Monday to Friday, with ABC serving the same area on weekends. The North and London were the two biggest regions, Granada preferred the North because of its tradition of home-grown culture, and because it offered a chance to start a new creative industry away from the metropolitan atmosphere of London. Compare this with London and its suburbs—full of displaced persons, and, of course, if you look at a map of the concentration of population in the North and a rainfall map, you will see that the North is an ideal place for television.
Bernstein selected a base from Leeds and Manchester, Granada executive Victor Peers believed Manchester was the preferred choice even before executives toured the region to find a suitable site
Ultra high frequency
Ultra high frequency is the ITU designation for radio frequencies in the range between 300 MHz and 3 GHz, known as the decimetre band as the wavelengths range from one meter to one decimetre. Radio waves with frequencies above the UHF band fall into the SHF or microwave frequency range, lower frequency signals fall into the VHF or lower bands. UHF radio waves propagate mainly by line of sight, they are blocked by hills, the IEEE defines the UHF radar band as frequencies between 300 MHz and 1 GHz. Two other IEEE radar bands overlap the ITU UHF band, the L band between 1 and 2 GHz and the S band between 2 and 4 GHz. Radio waves in the UHF band travel almost entirely by propagation and ground reflection, there is very little reflection from the ionosphere. They are blocked by hills and cannot travel far beyond the horizon, atmospheric moisture reduces, or attenuates, the strength of UHF signals over long distances, and the attenuation increases with frequency. UHF TV signals are generally more degraded by moisture than lower bands, occasionally when conditions are right, UHF radio waves can travel long distances by tropospheric ducting as the atmosphere warms and cools throughout the day.
The length of an antenna is related to the length of the radio waves used, the UHF antenna is stubby and short, at UHF frequencies a quarter-wave monopole, the most common omnidirectional antenna is between 2.5 and 25 cm long for example. UHF is widely used in telephones, cell phones, walkie-talkies and other two-way radio systems from short range up to the visual horizon. Their transmissions do not travel far, allowing frequency reuse, public safety, business communications and personal radio services such as GMRS, PMR446, and UHF CB are often found on UHF frequencies as well as IEEE802.11 wireless LANs. The widely adapted GSM and UMTS cellular networks use UHF cellular frequencies, radio repeaters are used to retransmit UHF signals when a distance greater than the line of sight is required. Omnidirectional UHF antennas used on mobile devices are usually short whips, higher gain omnidirectional UHF antennas can be made of collinear arrays of dipoles and are used for mobile base stations and cellular base station antennas.
The short wavelengths allow high gain antennas to be conveniently small, high gain antennas for point-to-point communication links and UHF television reception are usually Yagi, log periodic, corner reflectors, or reflective array antennas. At the top end of the band slot antennas and parabolic dishes become practical, for television broadcasting specialized vertical radiators that are mostly modifications of the slot antenna or helical antenna are used, the slotted cylinder, zig-zag, and panel antennas. UHF television broadcasting fulfilled the demand for additional over-the-air television channels in urban areas, much of the bandwidth has been reallocated to land mobile, trunked radio and mobile telephone use. UHF channels are used for digital television. UHF spectrum is used worldwide for mobile radio systems for commercial, public safety. Many personal radio services use frequencies allocated in the UHF band, major telecommunications providers have deployed voice and data cellular networks in UHF/VHF range
BBC London
BBC London is the BBC English Region producing local radio, television and online services in London and parts of the surrounding area. Its output includes the daily BBC London News and weekly Sunday Politics on television, the regions headquarters are situated in the new eastern extension of Broadcasting House. The flagship programme is broadcast between 18,30 and 19,00 each weekday evening, following the end of the BBC News at Six and is presented by Riz Lateef. Comparisons are inevitably made to the commercial TV regional competition, in this case ITV News London, BBC London can be viewed in any part of the UK on digital satellite channel 974 on the BBC UK regional TV on satellite service. BBC Radio London combines speech and music based programmes 24 hours a day, Broadcasting across London on 94.9 FM, DAB, Virgin Media Channel 930, Sky Channel 0152, Freeview Channel 721 and online. The station was known as BBC London Live, GLR. The current Breakfast show presenters are Penny Smith and Paul Ross, the Breakfast and Drivetime shows feature a wealth of local London news and comment with roving reporters out and about.
Other programmes such as JoAnne Good or Robert Elms include varied speech and music with local news bulletins every half-hour. The travel news on BBC Radio London is updated at 31 and 58 minutes past each hour during off peak times and its one of the few radio stations to have access to TfL cameras. The travel news online is updated from an independent travel information supplier and this data is fed from their main system onto BBC Londons website, via the BBC Travel News portal. The online section has features on aspects of travel in London. Sport is a major part of the radio schedule, with a 3-hour sports based programme each weeknight evening. This is considerably more than most other BBC local radio stations and reflects Londons large number of sporting teams, BBC London News launched on 1 October 2001 following changes to the coverage areas of BBC transmitters allowing for the establishment of new editorial areas. BBC London, as it came to be called, replaced the long-running Newsroom South East, there were many incarnations of regional news programmes in this area before the current programme was introduced in 2001.
Other identities for the London area coverage were London Plus, and this meant that sizeable communities which probably deserved dedicated programming of their own - such as Oxford, Luton and Medway - were often ill-served by a London-biased programme. There is overlap with the editorial areas of other BBC regions in this part of England. The previous new services for the area, in the old BBC South East region, were based in Shepherds Bush, White City. Following the launch of BBC London, the moved into facilities in Marylebone High Street, where the news service was based alongside BBC London News
Television transmitter and major relay sites in the United Kingdom