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| City | Bloomington, Indiana |
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| Ownership | |
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| WFIU | |
| History | |
First air date | March 3, 1969 (1969-03-03) |
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| NET (1969–1970) | |
Call sign meaning | Television Indiana University |
| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 66536 |
| ERP | 797kW |
| HAAT | 219 m (719 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 39°8′31″N86°29′42.9″W / 39.14194°N 86.495250°W /39.14194; -86.495250 |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | indianapublicmedia |
WTIU (channel 30) is aPBS membertelevision station inBloomington, Indiana, United States. It is owned byIndiana University alongsideNPR memberWFIU (103.7 FM). The two stations share studios on the Indiana University campus on East 7th Street in Bloomington; WTIU's transmitter is located on Sare Road on the city's southeast side.
The station also serves as the default PBS member station for theTerre Haute market, despite havingWVUT (channel 22) in Vincennes from theVincennes University. It is carried by most cable providers in west-central Indiana.
In late 1968, after receiving support from University president Herman B. Wells, Indiana University applied for alicense from theFederal Communications Commission (FCC) to operate aneducational television station. The station first signed on the air on March 3, 1969, as a member station ofNational Educational Television (NET); the first program ever broadcast on WTIU wasThe Friendly Giant, a Canadian-produced children's show. WTIU became a member of PBS when NET was reorganized on October 6, 1970.
Channel 30 originally maintained a very small staff of only three employees, and initially broadcast on Mondays through Saturdays for five hours a day during the afternoon hours. As the station was unable to afford equipment to allow programming to be transmitted incolor, much of the programming broadcast by WTIU was aired inblack and white in the early years. Through PBS' Program Differentiation Plan, the network's programming was eventually divided between it and three other PBS members in theIndianapolis market –WFYI (channel 20),Muncie-basedWIPB (channel 49) and by 1992, WTBU (channel 69, nowDaystarowned-and-operated stationWDTI).
WTIU's flagship original production is thepublic and cultural affairs programThe Weekly Special, in production since 2005.The Friday Zone, in production since 1999, is a children's program syndicated on seven PBS stations across Indiana. WTIU also regularly producesdocumentaries, typically focusing on local or regional topics. Documentary series produced by the station have includedOur Town (which focus on a single community's culture and history) andThe Spirit ofMonroe County (which focuses on the people and places of interest in Monroe County). WTIU also produces news updates in the form of twice-daily five-minuteNewsBreak segments as well as the half-hour weekly newsmagazineIndiana Newsdesk. In 1973, WTIU collaborated with the IU Opera Theater to produce a telecast of the operaMyshkin (an adaptation ofThe Idiot), which earned the station aPeabody Award.[2]
The station's signal ismultiplexed:
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30.1 | 720p | 16:9 | WTIU-HD | PBS |
| 30.2 | 480i | WTIU-D2 | World | |
| 30.3 | WTIU-D3 | Create | ||
| 30.4 | WTIU-D4 | Echo | ||
| 30.5 | WTIU-D5 | PBS Kids |
In 2009, WTIU upgraded the station's primary digital channel to allow the transmission of programming inhigh definition, originally maintaining a schedule separate from that of WTIU's main channel. The station also launched a secondary service on digital subchannel 30.2, branded as "TIU-2", which primarily aired educational programming and collegetelecourses; the subchannel was converted into "TIU World", serving as an affiliate of PBS World in 2010. At the same time, WTIU added two additional subchannels, respectively carrying programming from the lifestyle and how-to service Create (branded as "TIU Create"), safety and emergency network Echo (branded as "TIU Echo") and the respectively carrying programming from the children's service PBS Kids (branded as "TIU Kids").
WTIU began operating its digital signal in 2007, broadcasting on UHF channel 14. WTIU shut down its analog signal, overUHF channel 30, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television in the United Statestransitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal continued to broadcast on its pre-transition UHF channel 14,[4] usingvirtual channel 30.
Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the state ofIndiana | ||
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