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| Channels | |
| Branding | Central Florida's TV 27;Eyewitness News |
| Programming | |
| Affiliations |
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| Ownership | |
| Owner |
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| WFTV | |
| History | |
First air date | April 23, 2000; 25 years ago (2000-04-23) |
Former channel numbers |
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| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 55454 |
| ERP | 1,000kW |
| HAAT | 490 m (1,608 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 28°34′7″N81°3′16″W / 28.56861°N 81.05444°W /28.56861; -81.05444 |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | www |
WRDQ (channel 27) is anindependenttelevision station inOrlando, Florida, United States. It is owned byCox Media Group alongsideABC affiliateWFTV (channel 9). The two stations share studios on East South Street in downtown Orlando; WRDQ's transmitter is located nearBithlo, Florida.
WRDQ began broadcasting on April 23, 2000, and has been associated with WFTV throughout its history. The original permit was held by a company headed by Marsha Reece, a former WFTV anchor and reporter, and her husband. Before it launched, Reece contracted with WFTV for programming, and soon after it launched, Cox was able to buy WRDQ outright and create aduopoly. It airs syndicated programming, morning and nighttime newscasts from WFTV, and overflow programming when necessary. One subchannel is leased to provide a high-power signal forWTMO-CD, Orlando'sTelemundo station.
In 1984, Allen Sheets petitioned theFederal Communications Commission (FCC) for the addition of channel 27 atOrlando, Florida.[2] Owing to certain "UHF taboos" concerning interference between any two stations, a station two, three, four or five channels apart from an adjacent station (in this case,WMFE-TV on channel 24) could not place their transmitter within 20 miles (32 km) of the other due to intermodulation (spurious signals); nor could a station eight channels apart (WOFL on channel 35) within 20 miles so as to avoid anintermediate frequency beat signal. Furthermore, the new station had to space its transmitter 55 miles (89 km) away from channel 26 inDaytona Beach to avoid co-channel interference.[3] Although such an arrangement could not happen when the final Television Table of Assignments was first adopted on April 11, 1952,[4] theBithlo tower farm 12 miles (19 km) east of Orlando, where WMFE-TV and WOFL were transmitting, made this arrangement possible, and on August 31, 1984, the FCC added channel 27 on the condition that the station's transmitter be sited 4.6 miles (7.4 km) south of the city coordinates.[2]
In August 1988, an FCC administrative law judge awarded theconstruction permit for channel 27 in Orlando to Reece Associates Ltd., controlled byWFTV reporter Marsha Reece and her husband Rudy as well as two out-of-state investors. Reece was one of nine applicants for the channel, which Reece promised to program with a format including shows for the Black community.[5] In 1992, the final appeals by the losing applicants were dismissed, and Reece resigned from her post at WFTV to begin the process of building channel 27.[6] At one point, theSeminole Tribe of Florida considered investing in the permit.[7]
Between the time Reece applied for the permit and the time construction was proposed for the tower, upscale homes were built near the tower site inClermont, and residents were upset when the tower was proposed.[8] In February 1994,Lake County officials denied zoning for the tower 8–0.[9]
In 1995, Reece signed atime brokerage agreement with WFTV and agreed to co-locate the station—then designated WZWY—at WFTV's offices.[10] However, the project remained stalled over tower siting issues.[11] The station debuted as WRDQ on April 23, 2000, from a new 1,875-foot (572 m) tower inKissimmee. It offered talk show repeats in prime time, classic TV series, andTampa Bay Devil Rays baseball.[12] Several months before WRDQ signed on, in August 1999, the FCC began allowingduopolies involving commercially licensed television stations, allowing Cox to exercise an option to acquire the station outright on February 1, 2001. Marsha Reece told theOrlando Sentinel that they never thought the FCC would allow duopoly ownership and make the option legal.[13]
On May 24, 2011, Cox decided to use WRDQ to carry coverage of theCasey Anthony trial in full from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., with WFTV airing the last hour from 4 to 5 p.m., preempting the station's weekday programming schedule.[14] High interest in the trial eventually led to coverage being increasingly shifted to WFTV (with WRDQ generally only airing "more procedural" and "more dry or technical" portions);[15] on June 8, coverage was moved to WFTV entirely, after ABC granted Cox permission to moveABC daytime programming to WRDQ for the remainder of the trial.[16] It returned to WFTV upon the trial's conclusion. ABC daytime was temporarily moved to WRDQ once more during WFTV's coverage of theGeorge Zimmerman trial in 2013.[17]
In January 2002, WRDQ began airing a 10 p.m. newscast from WFTV.[18] It added a weekday morning newscast at 7 a.m. on WRDQ in 2007[19] and a half-hour 6:30 p.m. newscast on that station in 2010.[20] The latter was discontinued in 2013, though the next year the 10 p.m. news was expanded to an hour to provide stronger competition forFox station WOFL.[21][22]
WRDQ became the television broadcaster ofOrlando City SC soccer in 2016, replacing WOFL and WRBW.[23] WRDQ held the rights through 2018,[24] though the team reached a new multi-year deal with WOFL and WRBW in 2019.[25]
WRDQ's transmitter is located nearBithlo, Florida.[1] The station's signal ismultiplexed:
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27.1 | 720p | 16:9 | WRDQ | Independent |
| 27.2 | CourtTV | Court TV | ||
| 27.4 | 480i | HSN2 | WEST | |
| 31.2 | WTMO-SD | Telemundo (WTMO-CD) | ||
| 65.2 | 480i | 16:9 | Movies. | Movies! (WRBW) |
In 2013, Cox began leasing a subchannel of WRDQ to rebroadcast Orlando's low-powerTelemundo affiliate,WTMO-CD.[27]
WRDQ began airing a digital signal on April 1, 2002.[28] It ceased analog broadcasting on the originaldigital television transition date of February 17, 2009,[29] and its digital signal moved from its pre-transition UHF channel 14 to channel 27 for post-transition operations.[30]
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