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| Channels | |
| Branding |
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| Programming | |
| Affiliations | Citytv |
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
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| Sportsnet East | |
| History | |
First air date | September 8, 1997 (1997-09-08) |
Former call signs | CJNT-TV (1997–2011) |
Former channel numbers |
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| Technical information | |
Licensing authority | CRTC |
| ERP | 2.07kW |
| HAAT | 213.9 m (702 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 45°30′19.4″N73°35′29.3″W / 45.505389°N 73.591472°W /45.505389; -73.591472 |
| Links | |
| Website | www |
CJNT-DT (channel 62) is atelevision station inMontreal, Quebec, Canada,owned and operated by theCitytv network, a division ofRogers Sports & Media. The station maintains studios inside the Rogers Building at the corner ofMcGill College Avenue and Cathcart Street near thePlace Ville Marie complex indowntown Montreal, and its transmitter is located atMount Royal Park, near downtown Montreal.
The station signed on the air on September 8, 1997, but had its roots in the 1980s asLa Télévision Ethnique du Québec (TEQ), apublic access ethniccable channel. It had plans on moving over-the-air as early as the early 1990s, but was dogged by financial problems. Even after it signed on, its finances were in such a state that it never signed on earlier than noon. Part of the problem was that itseffective radiated power was only 11kilowatts, easily the weakest full-power station in Montreal and one of the weakest in North America—roughly on the same level aslow-power UHF stations in the United States. This effectively limited its over-the-air footprint to theIsland of Montreal,Jésus Island and a few areas on the mainland; even in those areas, its signal was marginal at best. Most viewers could only get a clear picture on cable.
Many shows that had aired on TEQ for many years did not make the cut for CJNT because they did not meet the standards for commercial broadcasting. However, many of the shows that did make it were of somewhat marginal quality. Its commitment to ethnic groups was questioned, especially late at night when it would frequently showEnglish-languageinfomercials for apsychic hotline.
Western International Communications bought CJNT in 1999. WIC owned Montreal'sCTV affiliate,CFCF-TV (channel 12), but was facing serious competition fromGlobal, which had expanded into Quebec the same year CJNT signed on. WIC figured CJNT would give it much-needed leverage in Montreal. It planned to relaunch CJNT on the model of Canada's first multicultural station,CFMT-TV inToronto, with 60% ethnic content and 40% American content. However, WIC was only able to buy the shares of CJNT held by Marie Griffiths, as ownership of the rest of the shares was being contested in court.[2] It was not allowed to make changes to CJNT's license without majority ownership, and its plans became moot when Canwest bought WIC's television assets in 2000. Canwest already held controlling interest in Global stationCKMI-TV, which was licensed in Quebec City but had activated a rebroadcaster in Montreal and moved the bulk of its operations there. The CRTC forced Canwest to put CFCF up for sale. Well aware that Canwest had bought CKMI to get its programming into Montreal, the CRTC ruled that Montreal's anglophone population was too small to permit atwinstick between CFCF and CKMI (CFCF was eventually sold to CTV). However, Canwest was allowed to keep WIC's interest in CJNT, and bought the remaining shares.[3]
Canwest had CJNT file forbankruptcy, and changed its conditions of licence to reduce the ethnic content to 60%. On September 8, 2001, Global relaunched the station with a mixture of ethnic, English and French language programming. The bulk of the English-language shows came from Canwest's secondary television system,CH. For all intents and purposes, CJNT thus became the third CH station, and the only one actually licensed to a major Canadian city. Since there was no "H" in "CJNT" (unlikeCHCH-TV andCHEK-TV), the CH in Montreal stood for "Canal Horizon" ("Channel Horizon" in English), although it changed its on-air brand name to just "CH" in 2002. The station remained a CH branded station until September 7, 2007, when Canwest decided to brand the station as "CJNT Montreal", while CH programming rebranded as "E! Montreal".
As a CH and later E! station, CJNT had many English-language American imports due to E!'s emphasis on American shows that could not fit onto Global's schedule. To partially comply with its ethnic programming remit, the station also carried airings of some of E!'s original programmingdubbed in other languages.[4]
On February 5, 2009, Canwest announced it would explore "strategic options", including possible sale or closure, for CJNT and its other stations in the E! system, saying "a second conventional TV network is no longer key to the long-term success" of the company.[5] WhileRogers Communications, owners of Canada's other over-the-air multicultural television stations through theOmni Television system, seemed to be a logical buyer for CJNT, that company reportedly had no interest in expanding its conventional television holdings at the time.[6]
On June 30, 2009, it was announced thatChannel Zero Inc. would purchase CJNT and CHCH inHamilton, Ontario from Canwest in exchange for $12 in cash and the assumption of various station liabilities.[7][8] TheCanadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) approved the sale on August 28 of that year.[9][10]
Channel Zero took control of the station's programming at midnightET on the morning of August 31. On that date, CJNT disaffiliated from E! (which would shut down later that day) and adopted a new schedule featuring a mix of music videos and already existing local ethnic programming during the day, and foreign movies at night, and reverted to branding itself as simply "CJNT". There was no American simsub programming for the first year.[11] Despite initial plans calling for a majority of the music videos to be foreign, most would end up being English-language videos with a moderate amount of French and foreign language videos included.[12] In addition, CJNT would add, in sparse amounts, additional programming during the 2009–2010 season, includingLet's Get It On, amixed martial arts program;Ed the Sock'sThis Movie Sucks!, a movie show featuring the formerMuchMusic character alongside co-hostLiana Kerzner and comedianRon Sparks; and infomercials.
On June 14, 2010, Channel Zero announced it would be rebranding CJNT as "Metro 14" in the fall, to appeal to a wider urban audience; the "14" represents its cable slot onVidéotron in the Greater Montreal area.[13] In September 2010, CJNT began airing American network television series for the first time since Channel Zero took ownership, includingEverybody Hates Chris,Jimmy Kimmel Live!, andNightline. In addition to the American network series, CJNT began airing the CHCH produced talk show,Sportsline with Mark Hebscher. On February 2, 2011, at 6 a.m. ET, the station officially rebranded as "Metro 14", months behind the original announced date of fall 2010.[14]
Seeking to expand its television holdings,Rogers Media announced on May 3, 2012, its intent to acquire CJNT from Channel Zero, with plans to convert the station into an owned-and-operated station of itsCitytvtelevision system (was known simply as City from December 2012 to September 2018). Simultaneously with the announcement of its pending purchase of the station, Rogers also announced it had signed an affiliation agreement with CJNT, allowing it to begin carrying Citytv programming on June 4, 2012, while the sale still awaited approval. The deal gave Citytv stations in all provinces west ofAtlantic Canada as well as the system's first television station located east of theGreater Toronto Area; Citytv programming had already been available in Quebec via cable and satellite through distribution of the system's owned-and-operated broadcast stations out ofToronto,Edmonton,Calgary,Winnipeg andVancouver.[15] The deal was announced at the same time Rogers Media was awaiting CRTC approval of its purchase of cable-only educational serviceSaskatchewan Communications Network (which had carried Citytv programming from 3 p.m. to 6 a.m. daily since January 2, 2012) from Bluepoint Investment Corporation, which effectively made CJNT Citytv's seventh owned-and-operated station.[16] Starting in the fall of 2012, the station began using the brand "Citytv on Metro 14" (later "City on Metro 14") during Citytv programming.
Most Channel Zero-owned and -acquired programming was dropped at this time, aside from the weekday morning showMetro Debut (a Toronto-based program that primarily consisted of music videos interspersed with news, weather, and traffic updates), which itself was expanded to three hours. To comply with CJNT's obligations to carry multicultural programming, the station also aired programming from Rogers'Omni Television system (particularlyOmni News). Initially, the station did not carry Citytv prime time programming, with non-ethnic programming confined primarily toCityLine, and syndicated and Citytv original programming during the late afternoon, early evening, and overnight hours. Selected U.S. and Citytv original programming was added in prime time upon the start of the 2012–13 season, but continued to be accompanied by Omni programming.[17][18]
In its purchase application to the CRTC, heard at a public hearing on November 7, 2012, Rogers requested to convert CJNT to a full English-language commercial licence with programming and conditions of licence similar to the company's other Citytv stations. Alternatively, if the conversion were not to be approved, Rogers requested that certain of the station's current conditions of licence regarding ethnic programming be relaxed. A separate application was heard as part of the same public hearing for a new Montreal multicultural station,CFHD-DT, filed by a group led by Montreal's Nowrouzzahrai family; Rogers indicated that if CJNT's sale/conversion and the CFHD licence were both approved, it would provide funding for, and make Omni programming available to, the new station.[19] The CRTC approved both the sale and conversion of CJNT[20] and the application for CFHD on December 20, 2012.[21] With the conversion, CJNT is the first over-the-air station in Canadian television history to have its licensed format changed.
Rogers announced it would officially rebrand the station as "City Montreal" on February 4, 2013.[22] It assumed the full City schedule on this date, and finally abandoned the "Metro 14" brand several weeks later. The station continued to air an hour of Omni programming mornings at 7 a.m. and at several other times on weekends until the fall of 2013,[23] as CFHD had not yet launched.[24] The station began introducing a new slate of local programming, including the three-hour morning showBreakfast Television on weekdays (which premiered August 26, 2013), and a weekly half-hour local sports show,Montreal Connected (laterSportsnet Central Montreal, which premiered May 30, 2013),[25] which Rogers promised to the CRTC in its application to buy CJNT.[20] In addition, an independently produced weekly series,Only In Montreal, began airing in July 2013.[26]
On September 2, 2014, Rogers andSportsnet announced that it had acquired English-language regional television rights to theMontreal Canadiens under a three-year deal. In addition to games that may be carried by City as part ofHockey Night in Canada, CJNT served as an overflow channel for games not carried by the Sportsnet networks.[27]
Sportsnet Central Montreal was cancelled in September 2017. A largely-identical program with the same panelists known asMontreal Sports Weekly premiered on CFHD shortly afterward.[28]
![[icon]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=https%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aWiki_letter_w_cropped.svg) | This sectionneeds expansion with: further information on CJNT's local programming. You can help byadding missing information.(February 2015) |
Since its inception, under Canwest ownership, CJNT was the only station in the CH/E! system not to air any newscasts under theCH News brand.
Local evening and late-night newscasts under the brandingCityNews Montreal launched on September 3, 2018, as part of an expansion of local news programming by Citytv's owned-and-operated broadcast stations. Both newscasts air for an hour each.[29][30] Similarly to the format of its sister station in Toronto, CJNT's newscasts use an "anchorless" format, where all stories are presented by videojournalists on the field, eschewing in-studio anchors.[31][32]
From August 23, 2013, to September 5, 2019, CJNT produced a local version of Citytv's morning showBreakfast Television, which ran for three hours on weekdays. On September 5, 2019, Rogers announced that the show had been cancelled effective immediately after just over six years on-air. A company executive stated that the program was "not sustainable". As of its most-recent license renewal, the station was no longer explicitly required to produce a morning newscast, with its commitments to local news programming now being fulfilled by the two nightly newscasts.[33]
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 62.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | CJNT-DT | Main CJNT-DT programming /Citytv |
On August 27, 2011, four days before Canadian television stations in CRTC-designated mandatorymarkets were totransition from analogue to digital broadcasts under federal mandate,[35] the station shut down its analog transmitter andflash cut its digital signal into operation onUHF channel 49, usingvirtual channel as 62. However, its digital signal operates at only 4 kilowatts – roughly equivalent to 20 kilowatts for an analogue signal. As a result, the station's coverage area is not much larger than it was in analogue.