BBC Local Radio roll-out on Freeview

a516 · 02/03/15 - 01:24

As of 01/03/2015, BBC Local Radio is available in the following areas, for users with the following regional news programmes on BBC One:

BBC Radio Bristol - channel 719 - Points West
BBC London - channel 721 - BBC London News
BBC WM - channel 722 - Midlands Today

As of 01/03/2015, the following services have been spotted testing as a hidden stream that can't be accessed on most Freeview devices, in the regions served by the following regional TV news services:
BBC Radio Cambridge - Look East
BBC Radio Devon - Spotlight
BBC Radio Leeds - Look North (Leeds - Yorkshire)
BBC Radio Manchester - North West Today/Tonight
BBC Radio Newcastle - Look North (Newcastle - NE & Cumbria)
BBC Radio Norfolk - Look East
BBC Radio Nottingham - East Midlands Today

The channel range 719-722 is used for BBC Local Radio on Freeview. The stations are broadcast alongside other BBC Radio stations on Freeview via multiplex PSB1/BBC-A.

Why are only certain stations appearing on Freeview?
The emerging pattern is that the BBC Local Radio station co-located with BBC Regional TV in each region is the first to go live on Freeview. There is sufficient capacity for additional BBC Local Radio stations to go live in the future.

Issues
FM and editorial areas vary in comparison to TV regions so that the roll-out of BBC Local Radio may amplify some of the regional anomalies already experienced on regional TV services. Broadly, TV transmitters were originally located based on providing maximum coverage before extra layers of regionality, e.g. through sub-regions, were added in later decades. But most listeners affected by anomalies can continue to listen on FM, DAB and online.

If you spot any new BBC local radio stations on Freeview, post below.

jimbo · 02/03/15 - 09:43

If you do, please can you also provide PIDs and SID numbers where possible - ie the technical background info.

FREEVIEW PIDs

BBCA/MUX 1/PSB1 (as at 02/03/2015)

101/102 (100): BBC1
201/202 (200): BBC2
301/302 (300): BBC3
401/402 (400): BBC4
501/502 (500): BBC News
601/602 (600): BBC Parliament
301/302 (700): CBBC
401/402 (800): CBeebies
951/952 (950): BBC Red Button 1
1002 (1000): Radio 1
1102 (1100): Radio 2
1202 (1200): Radio 3
1302 (1300): Radio 4 DAB
1402 (1400): Radio 5 Live
1502 (1500): Radio 5 Live Sports Extra
1602 (1600): Radio 6 Music
1702 (1700): Radio 4 Extra
1802 (1800): Radio 1 Xtra
1902 (1900): Asian Network
2002 (2000): World Service
3202 (3200) 6148: BBC London 94.9 (Crystal Palace)
6149: BBC Radio WM (Sutton Coldfield, Ridge Hill, Lark Stoke, Bromsgrove, The Wrekin)
3202 (3200) 6151: BBC Radio Norfolk (Tacolneston, Sandy Heath, Sudbury)
3202 (3200) 6152: BBC Radio Bristol (Mendip)
3202 (3200): BBC Radio Manchester (Winter Hill)
3202 (3200) 6153: BBC Radio Newcastle (Pontop Pike, Caldbeck, Chatton, Bilsdale)
3202 (3200) 6154: BBC Radio Leeds (Emley Moor)
3302 (3300) 6510: BBC Radio Nottingham (Waltham/Nottingham)
3302 (3300) 6210: BBC Radio Devon (Caradon Hill, Huntshaw Cross, Beacon Hilll, Redruth, Stockland Hill)
3502 (3500) 6285: BBC Radio Cambridgeshire (Tacolneston, Sandy Hath, Sudbury)

This is a full mux list with PIDs and SIDs where known. Any more please can you fill in the gaps.

Thanks

fmradiotuner1 · 02/03/15 - 10:23

Strange I would have preferred Sudbury to have BBC Essex or Suffolk but another station is better than nothing.

Anthony_UK · 02/03/15 - 10:57

If BBC Radio Lancashire goes from Winter Hill in stereo from Freeview it'll cover the whole of NW England and beyond NOT just Lancashire heehee! Winter Hill also gets into South Cumbria North Wales parts of Shropshire North Staffordshire as well! It'll be great to hear BBC Radio Lancashire widely if this happens. Pendle Forest Haslingden and Lancaster would also carry BBC Radio Lancashire on Freeview too, so complete coverage indeed.

Mark Smith · 02/03/15 - 13:06

fmradiotuner1 wrote: »

Strange I would have preferred Sudbury to have BBC Essex or Suffolk but another station is better than nothing.

I think the reason for that is given in the OP. I hope Suffolk is included, it's one of just a few BBC stations not available on DAB so it should be. When football is on FM is the only way of listening. After the initial testing we may see Cambridge disappear from Tacolneston/Sudbury and Norfolk from Sandy Heath, and more stations added, but who knows what will happen.

Spot · 02/03/15 - 13:47

Stephen Bumfrey (Radio Norfolk) has just made a reference to this on air, saying his show tomorrow (12 till 4) will be the first show to be broadcast on Freeview 719 from Tacolneston.

Mark C · 02/03/15 - 14:37

I'm told BBC Solent has been spotted lurking on Rowridge (no surprise)

I assume it's on Hannington and Midhurst too, I look forward to it, if true

jimbo · 02/03/15 - 14:44

Mark C wrote: »

I'm told BBC Solent has been spotted lurking on Rowridge (no surprise)

I assume it's on Hannington and Midhurst too, I look forward to it, if true

Whoever told you - do they have the SID and PIDs for this?

Good news there is another one testing.

Mark C · 02/03/15 - 15:03

jimbo wrote: »

Whoever told you - do they have the SID and PIDs for this?
.

It's come via a contrived route, but I'll endeavour to find out.

The only BBC TV regions not reported so far are:-

South East (Dover, Heathfield, Bluebell)

Hull and Lincs (Belmont)

jimbo · 02/03/15 - 17:04

Mark C wrote: »

It's come via a contrived route, but I'll endeavour to find out.

The only BBC TV regions not reported so far are:-

South East (Dover, Heathfield, Bluebell)

Hull and Lincs (Belmont)

Thanks. Can you try to find out the extra PIDs etc so we have a full list of data?

PhilipS · 02/03/15 - 17:09

There were some exchanges on the other thread about how BBC HW could be served on Freeview - it does need to be on Ridge Hill (for Herefordshire), but Worcestershire is more complex - although almost the whole county can get a signal from Malvern, Bromsgrove or Ridge Hill, a considerable number get their signals direct from Sutton Coldfield, and quite a few from Lark Stoke. Putting the thing on Sutton Coldfield Freeview would sort that out.

I'd imagine though that SC has similar overlaps - including its dependent relays - to a greater or lesser extent with Shropshire, Stoke, Derby and Leicester - and of course WM and C&W. And there are people up on the top of the Cotswolds who use the thing in preference to Ridge Hill. The big transmitters aren't going to please everyone if this rollout is limited to four locals.

Is SC the worst offender in this regard? Does any other transmitter serve a significant part of more than seven locals' area?

countyboy · 02/03/15 - 17:14

Sorry to be a bit naive about this, but will the BBC local stations mentioned in this thread in earlier postings also be carried on the relay transmitters associated with the main transmitters mentioned?

Mark C · 02/03/15 - 17:14

PhilipS wrote: »

Is SC the worst offender in this regard? Does any other transmitter serve a significant part of more than seven locals' area?

Crystal Palace, equal with seven ?

London (all of)
Berks (East of)
Essex (West and south)
Surrey (Almost all)
3CR (A lots of Bucks, fair bit of Herts)
Kent (Far north west)
Sussex (Crawley area)

Spot · 02/03/15 - 17:32

countyboy wrote: »

Sorry to be a bit naive about this, but will the BBC local stations mentioned in this thread in earlier postings also be carried on the relay transmitters associated with the main transmitters mentioned?

Yes, they're on the BBC A mux which is carried at all sites.

jimbo · 02/03/15 - 20:04

UPDATE

Just spoken to BBC and they have confirmed the following from tomorrow (3 March)

All these start officially on Freeview on 3 March 2015:

719:
BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Solent
BBC Radio Newcastle
BBC Radio Manchester
BBC Radio Leeds

720
Radio Nottingham
Radio Devon

On transmitters in the respective areas

Mark C · 02/03/15 - 20:28

jimbo wrote: »

UPDATE

Just spoken to BBC and they have confirmed the following from tomorrow (3 March)

All these start officially on Freeview on 3 March 2015:

719:
BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Solent
BBC Radio Newcastle
BBC Radio Manchester
BBC Radio Leeds

720
Radio Nottingham
Radio Devon

On transmitters in the respective areas

No launch for Radio Cambs yet then ?

chrisy · 02/03/15 - 20:58

Mark C wrote: »

No launch for Radio Cambs yet then ?

I'd hazard a guess as it's the first "two local radio stations" site they might be just be testing for now. Or it could be a mistake. We'll find out tomorrow!

jimbo · 03/03/15 - 00:58

jimbo wrote: »

UPDATE

CORRECTION!

The corrected list can be found below. All correct except I did not mention Radio Cambridgeshire. It Is starting tomorrow on 722.

Just spoken to BBC and they have confirmed the following from tomorrow (3 March)

All these start officially on Freeview on 3 March 2015:

719:
BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Solent
BBC Radio Newcastle
BBC Radio Manchester
BBC Radio Leeds

720
Radio Nottingham
Radio Devon

On transmitters in the respective areas

CORRECTION!

The corrected list can be found below. All correct except I did not mention Radio Cambridgeshire. It Is starting tomorrow on 722.

719:
BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Solent
BBC Radio Newcastle
BBC Radio Manchester
BBC Radio Leeds

720
Radio Nottingham
Radio Devon

722
Radio Cambridgeshire

On transmitters in the respective areas. Cambridgeshire on the same transmitters as Radio Norfolk

countyboy · 03/03/15 - 08:42

PhilipS wrote: »

There were some exchanges on the other thread about how BBC HW could be served on Freeview - it does need to be on Ridge Hill (for Herefordshire), but Worcestershire is more complex - although almost the whole county can get a signal from Malvern, Bromsgrove or Ridge Hill, a considerable number get their signals direct from Sutton Coldfield, and quite a few from Lark Stoke. Putting the thing on Sutton Coldfield Freeview would sort that out.

I'd imagine though that SC has similar overlaps - including its dependent relays - to a greater or lesser extent with Shropshire, Stoke, Derby and Leicester - and of course WM and C&W. And there are people up on the top of the Cotswolds who use the thing in preference to Ridge Hill. The big transmitters aren't going to please everyone if this rollout is limited to four locals.

Is SC the worst offender in this regard? Does any other transmitter serve a significant part of more than seven locals' area?

Yes, parts of north Oxfordshire receive from Sutton Coldfield and its relays in the county.
Also. there is a very small percentage of Gloucestershire's population served by the Winchcombe and Lark Stoke relays of Sutton Coldfield.

jimbo · 03/03/15 - 09:01

I have just spotted another link with all these stations - and it does relate to all of the current batch of stations

All of the local stations launching on Freeview today (3 March) as well as all those local already on Freeview in England, as well as those in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland broadcast in STEREO online.

The remaining local stations in England are in MONO online and it is hoped these will become stereo by the summer - around July apparently.

That may give us a clue as to any future roll-out of these stations. We will have to keep an eye out online to see which are next to go stereo!

That does not mean of course that they will necessarily go on Freeview afterwards

fmradiotuner1 · 03/03/15 - 09:44

BBC Norfolk & Cambridge are now working on Sudbury.

Greebo · 03/03/15 - 09:45

LCN tables have just updated on Winter Hill, BBC Radio Manchester "BBC Manchester" has appeared as expected on 719. Also "BBC Leeds" has appeared in the Service Table as an overlap service, though not broadcast from WH or its relays.

Clearly we are going to have a bunch of these services detected across the country. Can I suggest we hang fire a bit on the changelog thread and later on let somebody who has tracked it all (any volunteers?) do a single changelog post covering as much as possible?

jimbo · 03/03/15 - 09:49

Greebo wrote: »

LCN tables have just updated on Winter Hill, BBC Radio Manchester "BBC Manchester" has appeared as expected on 719. Also "BBC Leeds" has appeared in the Service Table as an overlap service, though not broadcast from WH or its relays.

Clearly we are going to have a bunch of these services detected across the country. Can I suggest we hang fire a bit on the changelog thread and later on let somebody who has tracked it all (any volunteers?) do a single changelog post covering as much as possible?

That makes perfect sense. However, here we can log each individual change as normal.

kev · 03/03/15 - 10:02

Greebo wrote: »

LCN tables have just updated on Winter Hill, BBC Radio Manchester "BBC Manchester" has appeared as expected on 719. Also "BBC Leeds" has appeared in the Service Table as an overlap service, though not broadcast from WH or its relays.

Clearly we are going to have a bunch of these services detected across the country. Can I suggest we hang fire a bit on the changelog thread and later on let somebody who has tracked it all (any volunteers?) do a single changelog post covering as much as possible?

Sorry, updated the changelog before seeing this post.

On Waltham "BBC Nottingham" has appeared on LCN 720 on PSB1.

Channel 6150
On Table_ID: 0x42 (current mux)
Service Name: BBC Nottingham
Provider Name: 
Transport Stream ID: 4166 (0x1046) 
Original Network ID: 9018 (0x233a)

Also, the following overlap services are also visible:-

BBC WM
BBC Norfolk
BBC Leeds
BBC Cambridge

chrisy · 03/03/15 - 10:13

fmradiotuner1 wrote: »

BBC Norfolk & Cambridge are now working on Sudbury.

Ditto Sandy Heath.

Dave_Anthony · 03/03/15 - 10:14

Radio Devon now on 720 from Redruth (Cornwall!!)

Hey there!

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BBC Local Radio roll-out on Freeview

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