Fiktiv Canada - CHCH

CHCH-DT, virtual channel 11 (UHF digital channel 15), is an independent television station licensed to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The station is owned by Channel Zero. CHCH's studios are located near the corner of Jackson and Caroline Streets in downtown Hamilton, with additional offices at the Marriott on the Falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Its transmitter is located at 481 First Road West in Stoney Creek.

On cable, the station is available on Cogeco channel 12 in Hamilton, and on Rogers Cable channel 11 in the Greater Toronto Area. On satellite, it is carried across Canada on Bell Satellite TV channel 1057 and Shaw Direct channel 141.

The station signed on the air on June 7, 1954, operating as an affiliate of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). Its studios at 163 Jackson Street West were previously used by CJSH-FM. After CJSH's shutdown, its studios were converted for CHCH. It is the oldest privately owned television station in the Hamilton-Toronto area. At the time, all privately owned television stations in Canada were required to be CBC affiliates. CHCH-TV was founded by Ken Soble, a leader of Hamilton's urban renewal movement, and owner of radio station CHML (900 AM).

In 1961, CHCH disaffiliated itself from the CBC and became an independent station. There were three reasons for disaffiliating from CBC: Hamilton is part of the Toronto market, and Toronto-based CBLT already provided full network service to some of CHCH's viewing area; CBLT was about to increase its transmitter power and change frequencies (from VHF channel 9 to channel 6, and eventually channel 5), resulting in a near-100 percent overlap with CHCH; and the station's managers wanted to produce more local programming, instead of being forced to carry CBC programming.

CHCH became the first (and for over a decade, the only) television station in Canada not to be affiliated with any network, as the other private stations (which signed on the air in 1960 or early 1961) that were not affiliated with the CBC had formed the CTV network in October 1961.

In the mid-1960s, CHCH was the lead station in United Program Purchase, a consortium of Canadian television stations which began purchasing some programming rights separately from the CTV and CBC networks.

By 1966, UPP was attracting media coverage as the potential foundation for a third Canadian television network. In the fall of that year, Soble's Niagara Television, the licensee of CHCH, put forward a proposal for a network to be branded as NTV. In the original plan, CHCH would have served as the network's flagship station for the Greater Toronto Area. However, the application faced numerous regulatory hurdles and delays, and its main financial backer, Power Corporation of Canada, backed out in 1969. By 1970, however, the network application was revived by former CHCH executive Al Bruner's new Global Communications corporation, with Niagara Television and CHCH no longer involved in the bid; the Global Television Network network launched in 1974 on the new CKGN-TV.

Despite the station's lack of success in becoming a full-fledged network, it did become one of Canada's most prominent syndicators of non-network programming in the 1970s and 1980s, with many of its locally produced entertainment programs airing on television stations across Canada and sometimes internationally.

CHCH became a national superstation on January 1, 1982, when Cancom (now Shaw Broadcast Services) began carrying the station and three others (CHAN-TV Vancouver, CITV Edmonton, and TCTV, essentially a rebroadcaster of CFTM-TV Montreal) to cable television providers in remote regions of the country that otherwise only had access to the CBC.

In 1990, Western International Communications (WIC) purchased CHCH. Although the station had been available on cable television in many Ontario markets for years, its broadcast signal coverage was expanded throughout Ontario in 1997 with the launch of several rebroadcasters, in an effort to compete with the reach of Global's Ontario station CIII (channel 6), and with the Baton Broadcast System, a group of mostly CTV-affiliated stations that served most of the province. In turn, WIC rebranded the station as "ONtv" ("Ontario Television"), in line with the branding conventions of many of the company's other stations, such as CHAN-TV in Vancouver (which was branded as "BCTV"), CITV-TV in Edmonton (which was branded as "ITV"), and CHCA-TV in Red Deer, Alberta (which was branded as "RDTV").

Local news programming shifted focus from the station's core market, the Hamilton area, toward Ontario as a whole, in an attempt to challenge what was then a regional news service provided by Global. However, with Hamilton now being largely an afterthought, and other local stations (in Toronto and elsewhere) already strong in the ratings, the shift was unsuccessful, and CHCH's ratings decreased. During the ONtv years, the station also aired WIC's nightly Canada Tonight newscast.

In 2000, Canwest purchased WIC's television assets. Since Global had already served the Hamilton area through flagship station CIII-TV's transmitter in Paris, Ontario, Canwest rebranded the station "CH" (or "CH Hamilton") on February 12, 2001 and launched the CH television system in September of that year. This move launched a secondary television system for Canwest's stations in medium-sized cities located near larger markets. Local news coverage was revamped and refocused on the Hamilton/Halton/Niagara region.

Despite the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission's (CRTC) television station ownership restrictions (one station per owner, per language in each market), Canwest was permitted to maintain CHCH's coverage of other markets throughout most of Ontario. However, it could not broadcast to Thunder Bay, Peterborough or Kingston because of opposition from local television stations. Some cable providers outside of Ontario also continue to carry CHCH as a form of "superstation". Its over-the-air signal also easily covers Buffalo, New York and Erie, Pennsylvania across the Canada–United States border.

On June 7, 2004 at 8:00 p.m., CHCH-TV celebrated exactly 50 years on the air. At this time, the station aired a documentary profiling the station's history, entitled The First 50 Years: A Half Century of CH, which was hosted by Matt Hayes. It was announced that the CH brand would change starting in 2007; however, it remained in use until September 7, 2007 when Canwest rebranded CHCH's local programming from CH Hamilton to CHCH News following the relaunch of the national CH service as E! under a brand licensing agreement with the E! cable channel in the United States. CHCH's non-news schedule was rebranded on the same day as "E! Ontario".

On February 5, 2009, Canwest announced it would explore "strategic options", including the possible sale or closure, of CHCH and the company's other stations in the E! system, saying "a second conventional TV network is no longer key to the long-term success" of the company. A grassroots group, fronted by Live @ 5:30 co-host Donna Skelly, surfaced with an intent to purchase CHCH from Canwest and return the station to its former local focus.

In March 2009, paperwork filed with the CRTC for a one-year renewal of CHCH's licence revealed that the station was projected to lose nearly $30 million during the station's 2010 fiscal year which began on September 1, 2009 – with projected revenues of just $41 million against costs of $69 million. John Douglas, a spokesperson for Canwest, said that CHCH, and its other stations in the E! group, were money losers during the last decade, coupled with the Canadian broadcasters' dependency on American programming for profits.

On June 30, 2009, Channel Zero announced that it would purchase CHCH and CJNT in Montreal from Canwest in exchange for $12 in cash and the assumption of various station liabilities. The CRTC approved the sale on August 28, 2009. Channel Zero took control of the station's programming at 12:00 a.m. Eastern Time on the morning of August 31, beginning its tenure with a film from the 1980s. CHCH disaffiliated itself from E! (which shut down at the end of that day), and adopted a new programming format consisting of local newscasts throughout the day on weekdays and movies at night (as well as all day on weekends, outside of limited newscasts, infomercials and other select programs during the morning and evening hours), and reverted to branding itself as "CHCH". The first film broadcast in prime time that night was Rocky, signifying the new ownership's come-from-behind spirit. CHCH would add, in sparse amounts, additional programming during the 2009–10 season, including Let's Get It On, a mixed martial arts program; Ed the Sock's This Movie Sucks!, a movie show featuring the former MuchMusic character alongside co-host Liana Kerzner and comedian Ron Sparks; and infomercials.

In September 2010, CHCH, for the first time since its purchase by Channel Zero, began airing American network television series; many of the programs that were added, including Smallville, Supernatural, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, 48 Hours Mystery, 20/20, Chuck, and 60 Minutes had been seen in the Toronto-Hamilton market on CKXT-TV (channel 52; that station's owner, Quebecor, was in the process of replacing it with the all-news cable channel Sun News Network). CHCH also debuted additional original local programs Sportsline (hosted by Mark Hebscher and Clint "Bubba" O'Neil), and launched a second series with Ed the Sock, the entertainment newsmagazine spoof I Hate Hollywood. Coinciding with the schedule changes was the introduction of an updated version of CHCH's classic multi-coloured logo used from the 1960s to the 1980s.

On April 10, 2011 Green Party leader Elizabeth May participated in a panel interview on CHCH, which she was invited to attend, as were the leaders of the Bloc Québécois, Liberals, New Democratic Party and Conservatives, by Channel Zero, whose president was disappointed by May's exclusion from the 2011 election leaders' debates.

On April 18, 2011, CKXT-TV converted from an independent station to a simulcast of the Sun News Network, leaving CHCH as the only independent station in the Toronto/Hamilton area (the station ceased operations approximately seven months later on November 1, 2011). On June 8, 2011 at Channel Zero's upfront presentation for advertisers for the 2011–12 television season, the company announced a programming distribution deal with 20th Century Fox, giving CHCH and CJNT access to show first-run exclusive broadcast movie premieres, most notably Avatar, which first aired in May 2012 on both stations, featuring the director's cut version of the film not shown in theatres. Other debut titles included Crazy Heart, Taken and X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

During a broadcast of News Now AM on April 20, 2012, Cogeco's and Shaw Cable's transmissions of CHCH's signal were interrupted for approximately three minutes by the broadcast of a scene from a hardcore gay pornography film from an unidentified adult-oriented specialty channel. The substitution appeared to have been made by a cable operator during repairs of severed cable lines, and not at CHCH, leaving the station's over-the-air viewers and subscribers of other cable and satellite providers unaffected. Channel Zero denied that the program in question came from any of its adult-oriented Category B specialty channels (Maleflixxx Television, XXX TV and AOV TV). The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission later announced it would be investigating the incident as a cable transmission issue.

In September 2012, CHCH acquired the rights to Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! from CBC Television, after the network's exclusive contract to carry both game shows expired. The shows were dropped for the fall 2014 season and The Simpsons began airing on Friday nights. In June 2014, CHCH celebrated its 60th anniversary of broadcasting.

In the spring of 2016, Channel Zero put the studios of CHCH-DT (from which the station has continuously operated, starting in 1954) on the market. The studios include the historic stone mansion "Pinehurst" (built in 1850 by local politician Tristram Bickle and owned by William Southam from 1892 until his death in 1932), as well as the large silver addition dubbed "Spaceship 11" for its futuristic appearance (built in 1983), for CA$7 million. The sale was to a private investor group named Television City, who will rent out half of "Spaceship 11" to CHCH-DT for two and a half years, while looking for other tenants (Pinehurst is protected by the Ontario Heritage Act and will not be altered). It is expected for the sale to close by the middle of November 2016.

In October 2018, CHCH announced a new location for their studios, leaving their long-time location on Jackson Street West in downtown Hamilton, and moving to 4 Innovation Drive in Flamborough. The property is to be renovated for a news operation, which the station hopes to have up and running by the spring of 2021.

In addition to its extensive amount of locally produced newscasts, which are geared primarily to the Golden Horseshoe region of Southern Ontario, CHCH also runs first-run domestic and American entertainment programs during primetime and the late evening hours, and feature films during the overnight hours and for much of the day on weekends.

McMaster Marauders university football was broadcast on the station during the late 1990s and early 2000s; beginning in 2015, CHCH resumed carrying Ontario University Athletics football, carrying the conference's playoff tournaments and, beginning in 2017 after Citytv passed on the package, some regular season games as well.

In August 2020, the Canadian Premier League announced a deal with CHCH to broadcast one game per week, every Sunday, in addition to the two games per week on CBC Sports.

CHCH-DT presently broadcasts 83 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 16 hours on weekdays and one and a half hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in regards to the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the highest local newscast output among all broadcast television stations in Canada, among all North American broadcast television stations (not counting 24-hour all-local-news stations such as Spectrum News), and among the numerous stations in the Buffalo Niagara Region.

Its heavy weekday newscast total is largely due to a prominent daytime rolling news block on weekdays (airing from 4:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., along with an hour-long newscast at 11:00 p.m.). In addition, the station also produces a half-hour sports discussion programme called Sportsline, which airs each weeknight at 7:00 p.m.; and a half-hour political discussion programme Square Off, which immediately follows Sportsline at 7:30 p.m.

Upon becoming an independent station on August 31, 2009, the station adopted a news-intensive format, replacing acquired programming in the 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. time periods on weekdays with expanded newscasts.

On September 12, 2011, CHCH increased its local news programming by launching a 90-minute extension of Morning Live, titled Morning Live First Edition, airing weekdays from 4:00 to 5:30 a.m.; this made CHCH the first Canadian television station (and the first in the Buffalo-Niagara region; WGRZ would follow with a 4:30 a.m. newscast in 2012) to air a morning newscast that starts before 5:30 a.m. The programme expanded to two hours, extending it from 4:00 to 6:00 a.m. on September 10, 2012. As a result, the station moved the original Morning Live broadcast's start time by a half-hour and its end time by one hour, running it from 6:00 to 10:00 a.m.