Branding PBS39 | ||
City Allentown, Pennsylvania Channels Digital: 39 (UHF)
Virtual: 39 (PSIP) Subchannels .1: 1080i 16:9 WLVT-DT
.4: 480i 4:3 Create
.5: 480i 4:3 Kids Affiliations .1: PBS
.4: Create
.5: PBS Kids Owner Lehigh Valley Public Telecommunications Corporation | ||
WLVT-TV, UHF digital channel 39, is a PBS member television station located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, United States. The station is owned by the Lehigh Valley Public Telecommunications Corporation. WLVT maintains studios located in the south side of Bethlehem, and its transmitter is located south of nearby Allentown atop South Mountain.
Contents
Overview
The station first signed on the air on September 7, 1965 as a member station of National Educational Television (NET), and eventually joined PBS at its inception in 1970. WLVT-TV serves the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania market; rated as Nielsen's number four DMA in the United States. The broadcast coverage for the station serves 6.7 million people or 2.9 million homes. WLVT-TV is commonly known as PBS39, referring to the main virtual channel of 39.1.
Although located in the Lehigh Valley, WLVT programming is designed to serve the population throughout the Philadelphia television market, and is carried by many television service providers in the operating region. The primary service area includes much of eastern Pennsylvania and parts of western and southern New Jersey. Cable television carriers include Comcast, Service Electric, RCN, Blue Ridge Cable and others. WLVT-TV is also available throughout the region via DirecTV and Dish Network.
In 2011, WLVT-TV relocated to a new studio facility on the south side of Bethlehem, adjacent to the ArtsQuest complex on the SteelStacks Campus, previously home to the Bethlehem Steel Corporation. The new station, equipped with two large studios, holds many local productions including Focus (a local magazine show), Scholastic Scrimmage, Faces of Jazz, and Behind the Guitar. WLVT also broadcasts airings of programming distributed by PBS, American Public Television, and other distributors.
Digital channels
The station's digital channel is multiplexed:
Analog-to-digital conversion
WLVT shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 39, on January 31, 2009. The station's digital signal relocated on its pre-transition UHF channel 62, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition, to its former analog-era UHF channel 39 for post-transition operations.