WPBS-TV


WPBS-TV, virtual channel 16, is a Public Broadcasting Service member television station licensed to Watertown, New York, United States and serving Upstate New York's North Country. The station is owned by the St. Lawrence Valley Educational TV Council. WPBS-TV's studios are located on Arsenal Street in Watertown, and its transmitter is located on St. Lawrence County Route 194 in Denmark.
WNPI-DT in Norwood operates as a full-time satellite of WPBS; this station's transmitter is located in South Colton, New York. WNPI covers areas of northeastern New York that receive a marginal to non-existent signal from WPBS, although there is significant overlap between the two stations' contours otherwise. WNPI is a straight simulcast of WPBS; on-air references to WNPI are limited to Federal Communications Commission -mandated hourly station identifications during programming. Aside from the transmitter, WNPI does not maintain any physical presence locally in Norwood.
The two stations combined have significant viewership in much of eastern Ontario, Canada, including Ottawa and Kingston; their station slogan "Your Two-Nation Station" reflects this Canadian audience.

History

The St. Lawrence Valley Educational Television Council, which was organized in 1958, originally produced educational television programming to be carried by local CBS affiliate WWNY-TV. In 1971, it established a free-standing PBS station, WNPE-TV, using WWNY's original studios on Champion Hill as the commercial station had already relocated to a larger facility in Watertown. Full-time satellite WNPI-TV signed on a few weeks later. Outgrowing the Champion Hill location itself, WNPE moved to a new building in Watertown in 1978.
Because of its large Canadian viewership, WNPE was one of the most successful PBS stations, with fundraising totals often exceeding those of stations in much larger markets.
For a minor sum, the rights to use the WPBS call letters were purchased from a small radio station in Conyers, Georgia in the late 1990s; the call sign change to WPBS-TV took effect on September 1, 1998. Following the shutdown of analog television signals, WPBS switched to a "-DT" suffix on July 2, 2009, as did WNPI; WPBS returned to the "-TV" suffix on March 11, 2020. Despite the calls, which mimic the callsign schemes used by stations owned by ABC, NBC and CBS in New York City and Los Angeles, WPBS-TV is not an owned-and-operated station, as PBS therefore cannot own or operate any of its member stations or regional member networks due to the network's local and non-profit nature; the WPBS callsign reflects the station's affiliation and programming, but not any special status within the PBS network.
Despite its strong viewership in Canada, Rogers Cable, the main cable provider in Ottawa, announced in July 2009 that it would replace WPBS on its systems with Detroit's WTVS by mid-August to provide a higher-quality PBS feed, as WTVS could be fed via fiber optic cable rather than from over-the-air signals. Shortly after receiving this news, a Facebook campaign called 'Save WPBS in Ottawa' urging Rogers to reconsider its decision to pull the station was launched, attracting hundreds of supporters, as well as local Ottawa politicians. On July 30, 2009, it was announced that WPBS would offer a fiber-optic feed of the station for Rogers transmitted from Buffalo, New York.
Erie, Pennsylvania's WQLN, which serves viewers in the London, Ontario area through Rogers, was also threatened with removal from the Rogers system; as with WPBS, WQLN offered a fiber connection with Rogers.

Coverage area

WPBS-TV can be seen by a total of 2.2 million viewers. This is despite the fact it is the smallest PBS member in New York State; there are only 252,000 people in its American viewing area. However, the signal from its two towers reaches far enough to serve the Ottawa Valley region via cable. This market, with over 1.5 million people–almost six times the population of WPBS' American viewing area)–is the fourth-largest in Canada. Much of WPBS' viewer support has also come from Canadian viewers, as 70% of donations during recent pledge drives came from viewers in Ottawa. The station also maintains a mailing address in Gananoque, Ontario to service its Canadian donors.
WPBS' service area comprises mostly rural areas and small towns. The only major urban areas in its service area are Ottawa and Kingston.
In the past, reflecting its two-nation audience, the U.S. and Canadian national anthems were played on station sign-on and sign-off.

Digital television

Digital channels

The stations' digital signals are multiplexed:
ChannelVideoAspectPSIP short nameProgramming
16.1
18.1		1080iWPBS HD
WNPI-HD		Main programming / PBS
16.2
18.2		480iWPBS-2
WNPI-2		Create
16.3
18.3		480iWPBS-3
WNPI		World
16.4
18.4		480iWPBS-4
WNPI4		PBS Kids

The four digital subchannels are identical for both WPBS-TV and WNPI-DT.
The station had requested an increase in power from 40 kW to 60 kW for each digital transmitter. While this request had not been addressed by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission in time for WPBS/WNPI's April 12, 2009 analogue shutoff date, which was sooner than the June 12, 2009 date for American analogue stations to end, a construction permit was issued later that year for the increased-power digital facilities.
WPBS-TV's former analogue channel number is currently in use by WXXI-TV in Rochester. WNPI-TV's former analogue channel number and antenna location has been reassigned to WWNY-CD, a Massena rebroadcaster of Fox affiliate WNYF-CD.

Programming

WPBS produces a variety of programming for both local and national distribution. For many outside New York and the surrounding region, WPBS is synonymous with programming ranging from Rod and Reel and Streamside. to Classical Stretch. They also carry other nationally distributed programs from PBS and American Public Television.

WPBS-produced TV series

WPBS-originated programming distributed to public television stations nationally by American Public Television includes:
WPBS-originated programming distributed to public television stations by the National Educational Telecommunications Association includes: