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| City | Athens, Georgia |
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| History | |
First air date | April 18, 1989 (36 years ago) (1989-04-18) |
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Former channel numbers |
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Call sign meaning | Univision Georgia |
| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 48813 |
| ERP | 1,000kW |
| HAAT | 328 m (1,076 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 33°48′26″N84°20′22″W / 33.80722°N 84.33944°W /33.80722; -84.33944 |
| Translator(s) | 35 (UHF) Athens |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | www |
WUVG-DT (channel 34) is atelevision station licensed toAthens, Georgia, United States, broadcasting the Spanish-languageUnivision andUniMás networks to theAtlanta area.Owned and operated byTelevisaUnivision, the station maintains studios on Peachtree Road NE in theBuckhead section of Atlanta and a primary transmitter inNorth Druid Hills.
WUVG-DT was established as WNGM-TV, a station serving the Athens area, in 1989. Its focus broadened to Atlanta in the 1990s as the station was sold several times, airing home shopping, music videos, and then anindependent format under the ownership ofUSA Broadcasting. It switched to Univision in January 2002, making it the first Spanish-language station in the market.
The station went on air on April 18, 1989, as WNGM-TV,[2] with thecall sign standing for "North Georgia Mountains".[3] Initially the station ran a general entertainment format withcartoons, classic and recentsitcoms, blocks ofcountry music programming, old movies andsyndicated first-run shows; it also aired a local newscast and magazine program focusing on north Georgia.[2]
WNGM-TV was owned by a company including the final two applicants for the channel: Georgia Mountain Corporation and Sunbelt Television, Inc., which merged their bids in 1985 and won the construction permit.[3] Its transmitter was located 60 miles (97 km) away from Atlanta, reaching Athens with a grade A signal while sending a very weak signal into easternmetro Atlanta. As a result, many syndicators sold the rights for shows that were already on the Atlanta stations to WNGM. The station provided an alternative to viewers in areas which had moderateVHF reception and poorUHF reception from Atlanta;Clarke County had a cable penetration rate of 83 percent, 30 points above the national average.[3]
NGM Television Partners, the licensee, sold the station for $10 million in 1996 to Whitehead Media, which the next year formalized a time brokerage agreement under whichPaxson Communications Corporation began operating channel 34.[4] However, Paxson opted the next year to divest itself of extra stations in markets where it controlled more than one, such as Atlanta, where it ownedWPXA-TV.[5] The $73.5 million sale by Paxson of the operating rights and by Whitehead of the licenses for WNGM-TV andWOAC inCanton, Ohio, to Global Broadcasting Systems, Inc.,[6] was terminated a month later when the buyer failed to post an escrow deposit.[7]
From 1996 until September 1, 1997, WNGM-TV aired Paxson's Infomall TVinfomercial network, then switching to separate but similar home shopping programming, which was an issue at play in a cable carriage dispute withMediaOne over whether it had to be placed on a series of major Atlanta-area cable systems.[8]
In 1998,USA Broadcasting acquired WNGM for $50 million.[9] It was part of a larger deal between Paxson and USA that allowed Paxson-owned stations inNew Orleans andMemphis to make early exits from affiliation contracts with theHome Shopping Network, gave Paxson a station servingPortland, Oregon, and put USA Broadcasting in every top 10 market butDetroit.[10] After the USA acquisition, the home shopping programming was dropped and replaced with music videos fromThe Box—which led the FCC to greenlight the station's push for must-carry in the Atlanta area that August.[8]
In November 1999, WNGM was the third of four USAB stations afterMiami'sWAMI-TV to convert to USAB's new "CityVision" general entertainment format and became "Hotlanta 34" under new WHOT-TV call letters. The centerpiece of the plan was a three-year contract for the rights to telecastAtlanta Hawks basketball.[11] The move was made afterWATL (channel 36) opted not to renew its deal because of the expanding program offerings ofThe WB.[12] However, after the format failed to take off where it was introduced and the company registered operating losses of $62 million in 2000, Diller opted to sell the stations to Univision in 2001.[13]
While some of the stations were used to startTelefutura, a second network, the purchase gave Univision its first ever broadcast outlet in Atlanta, where the Latino population had grown by 362 percent during the 1990s.[14] Under new WUVG call letters, channel 34 changed to Spanish-language programming on January 14, 2002.[15] While local news was not immediately added, WUVG began producing a public affairs program in Spanish,Nuestra Georgia (Our Georgia), the first such program on Atlanta television since 1997.[15]
WUVG launched its news department in April 2011, with two daily half-hour evening newscasts at 6 and 11 p.m.—branded asNoticias 34 Atlanta (News 34 Atlanta)—anchored by Amanda Ramirez (now atWLII-DT) and Gianncarlo Cifuentes.[16] The station also maintained a partnership with WGCL-TV (nowWANF) for news coverage.[17]
The station's other local program is a weekend newsmagazine,Conexión Fin de Semana.[18]
The station's signal ismultiplexed:
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 34.1 | 720p | 16:9 | WUVG-DT | Univision |
| 34.2 | UNM-HD | UniMás | ||
| 34.3 | 480i | 4:3 | GetTV | Get |
| 34.4 | 16:9 | Nosey | Nosey | |
| 34.5 | ShopLC | Shop LC | ||
| 34.6 | MSGold | MovieSphere Gold | ||
| 34.7 | BT2 | Infomercials |
WUVG-DT maintains a digital replacement translator, which enhances channel 34's coverage in the city of license, Athens.
| City of license | Call sign | Channel | ERP | HAAT | Facility ID | Transmitter coordinates |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Athens | WUVG-DT (DRT) | 35 | 13.5 kW | 111.3 m (365 ft) | 48813 | 33°59′36″N83°24′56″W / 33.99333°N 83.41556°W /33.99333; -83.41556 (WUVG-DT (DRT)) |
WUVG shut down its analog signal, overUHF channel 34, on June 12, 2009, as part of thefederally mandated transition from analog to digital television.[20] The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 48, usingvirtual channel 34; it was later repacked to channel 18.
Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the U.S. state ofGeorgia | ||
|---|---|---|
Includes stations in out-of-state TV markets, but reaching a portion of Georgia | ||
| ABC | ||
| CBS | ||
| Fox | ||
| NBC | ||
| The CW | ||
| MyNetworkTV | ||
| Ion Television | ||
| PBS | ||
| Religious | ||
| Spanish | ||
| Other | ||
| ATSC 3.0 | ||
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Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the state ofAlabama | ||
|---|---|---|
Includes stations in out-of-state TV markets, but reaching a portion of Alabama | ||
| ABC | ||
| CBS | ||
| Fox | ||
| NBC | ||
| The CW | ||
| MyNetworkTV | ||
| Ion Television | ||
| PBS |
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| Religious | ||
| Other | ||
| ATSC 3.0 | ||
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| Uforia Audio Network |
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| Univision Television Group |
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| Univision Online | |||||
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