WNIN (TV)


WNIN, virtual and VHF digital channel 9, is a Public Broadcasting Service member television station licensed to Evansville, Indiana, United States, serving the Tri-State area of southwestern Indiana, northwestern Kentucky and southeastern Illinois. Owned by WNIN Tri-State Public Media, it is sister to National Public Radio member station WNIN-FM. The two outlets share studios in downtown Evansville and transmitter facilities near Pelzer, Indiana.
On cable, WNIN is available on Charter Spectrum channel 9 in both standard and high definition, and on WOW! channels 2 and 802.

Background

WNIN signed on for the first time on March 5, 1970 owned by the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation. After a few months as a member of National Educational Television, it joined PBS in October.
Despite having the advantage of being on one of two VHF frequencies in the Tri-State, EVSC soon found itself in over its head running a full-service public television station. Within a year, WNIN was $59,000 in the red. Unable to raise enough money to close the gap, it took WNIN off the air in 1972. A year later, a group of Tri-State citizens formed Southwest Indiana Public Television and returned the station to the air. It bought the Carpenter House in 1986 and retired the mortgage on it three years later with the help of a capital campaign.
WNIN also programs and transmits two local cable channels: WNIN Learn and WNIN Create. WNIN Learn airs local Government-access television for Vanderburgh County and Evansville City government meetings produced off-site inside the Carpenter House via remote-controlled cameras located in the Vanderburgh County Civic Center. WNIN Learn also airs repeats of some PBS Kids programs. WNIN Create simulcasts the national Create channel which features how-to, creative and cooking programs.
Local programs produced by WNIN include Lawmakers and Newsmakers, as well as various live debates and local documentaries. As of 2010, all local programming is available online via the station's implementation of PBS' COVE platform.

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:
ChannelVideoAspectPSIP Short NameProgramming
9.11080iWNIN-HDMain WNIN programming / PBS
9.2480iWNIN-SDWNIN Create

The station carries Create on digital channel 9.2. Until October 2012, the station offered an audio simulcast of sister NPR member station WNIN-FM on digital channel 9.3.

Analog-to-digital conversion

WNIN discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over VHF channel 9, on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition VHF channel 12 to channel 9.

Indiana Channel

WNIN was the programming hub of the Indiana Public Broadcasting Stations project, the Indiana Channel. From 2006 to 2016, the Indiana Channel had run on digital subchannel 9.2 from 4 to 7 p.m. every weekday.