KMTR

KMTR, virtual channel 16 (UHF digital channel 17), is a dual NBC/CW+-affiliated television station licensed to Eugene, Oregon, United States. The station is owned by Roberts Media, LLC; the Sinclair Broadcast Group, which owns CBS affiliate KVAL-TV (channel 13), operates KMTR under a shared services agreement (SSA). The two stations share studios and transmitter facilities on Blanton Road in Eugene. KMTR maintained separate facilities on International Court in Springfield, Oregon, until 2020 when the station relocated to KVAL's building; master control and some internal operations for KMTR were based at the KVAL studios.

For the radio station formerly known as KMTR, see KLAC.
KMTR
Eugene, Oregon
United States
ChannelsDigital: 17 (UHF)
Virtual: 16 (PSIP)
Branding
  • NBC 16 (general)
  • NBC 16 News (newscasts)
  • CW Eugene (newscasts)
Programming
Affiliations
Ownership
OwnerRoberts Media, LLC
(KMTR Television, LLC)
OperatorSinclair Broadcast Group
(via SSA)
Sister stationsKVAL-TV[1]
History
First air dateOctober 4, 1982 (1982-10-04)
Former channel number(s)Analog:
16 (UHF, 1982–2009)
Former affiliationsKZWB cable: WB
Technical information
Licensing authorityFCC
Facility ID35189
ERP70 kW (STA)
1000 kW (CP)
HAAT294 m (965 ft) (STA)
450 m (1,476 ft) (CP)
Transmitter coordinates44°0′9″N 123°6′58.3″W (STA)
44°0′6″N 123°6′57″W (CP)
Translator(s)See below
Links
Public license informationProfile
LMS
Websitenbc16.com

KMTR reaches additional viewers in central and western Oregon via co-owned full-powered satellite stations KMCB in Coos Bay (virtual channel 23, UHF digital channel 22) and KTCW in Roseburg (virtual channel 46, UHF digital channel 36).

History

The station began broadcasting on October 4, 1982, after former NBC affiliate KVAL-TV began selectively omitting certain NBC prime time broadcasts from its evening lineup, replacing them with alternate programming from rival network, CBS. The resulting conflict over this programming decision preceded the introduction of KMTR to the media market, and a switch of KVAL's affiliation from NBC to CBS. The Columbia Empire Broadcasting Corporation of Yakima, Washington acquired the station in 1984.

In late 1995, the station was bought by the Wicks Broadcast Group of New York City. In March 1996, Wicks Broadcast Group named Brian Benschoter the station's new GM; he started shaking things up immediately for the third-place Eugene-based station. On May 21, 1996, he abruptly fired longtime sports anchors Brian Lamb and Steve Freedman without warning. Lamb, an 11½ year veteran of the station, and Freedman, an 8½ year employee, introduced the "Prep Athlete of the Week" segment that became an immensely popular weekly honor. The award is still considered by locals as the top media honor one can receive for high school sports in the Eugene/Springfield area. Lamb and Freedman were replaced by Joe Giansante, a sports talk radio host on KUGN AM 590.

In September 1998, an agreement between KMTR, The WB 100+ Station Group and the area's cable provider allowed the station to launch cable-only WB affiliate "KZWB". Since it was a cable-exclusive outlet, the call sign was not officially recognized by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). KMTR provided sales and promotional opportunities to the cable channel.[2][3][4]

In March 1999, Wicks sold KMTR to the Ackerley Group, who merged with Clear Channel Communications (now iHeartMedia) in 2001. KMTR was named "Station of the Year" for 2005 by the Oregon Association of Broadcasters (OAB).

In February 2006, the two satellite stations, KMTZ and KMTX, changed their call letters to KUCW and KTCW, respectively. In May 2005, KMTR signed a long term affiliation agreement with The CW, a replacement network for the WB.[5] In September 2006, KMTR added The CW on a digital subchannel, replacing the cable-only KZWB.

On April 20, 2007, Clear Channel entered into an agreement to sell its entire television stations group to Newport Television, a unit of Providence Equity Partners.[6] The deal closed on March 14, 2008.

KMTR shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 16, on February 17, 2009, the original target date on which full-power television stations in the United States were to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate (which was later pushed back to June 12, 2009).[7][8] The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 17.[9] Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 16.

In 2012, Newport Television entered into agreements to sell most of its stations to the Nexstar Broadcasting Group, Sinclair Broadcast Group, Cox Media Group and Shield Media, LLC. It would not be until November 26, 2012, when Newport announced a sale to Fisher Communications. Because Fisher already owns KVAL-TV, Fisher assigned the rights to acquire the FCC license to KMTR Television, LLC, which is wholly owned by Roberts Media, LLC. Roberts Media is wholly owned by veteran broadcaster Larry Roberts. KMTR Television, LLC then entered into a Shared Services Agreement with Fisher. WHAM-TV in Rochester, New York was the last remaining station to be owned by Newport Television as of November 2012 that had not yet been sold, until December 3 when it was announced that Sinclair would acquire the non-license assets of WHAM. While still awaiting FCC approval of the sale to KMTR Television, LLC, on April 11, 2013, Fisher announced that it would sell its properties, including KVAL and the planned Share Services Agreement with KMTR, to Sinclair.[10] The FCC granted its approval of KMTR to KMTR Television, LLC on April 24 and the sale was consummated June 3, 2013.[11] On February 19, KMTR was the sole Newport Television property, until June 1 when it was the last station to have its sale completed.[12] After the completion of the sale, certain operations and personnel changes were made.[13] The sale of the Fisher stations to Sinclair was completed on August 8, 2013.[14]

In 2016, KMTR remained the only "Big Four" network-affiliated station in Western Oregon to produce its local newscasts in pillarboxed 4:3 standard definition until finally switching to 16:9 on October 22. KMTR upgraded to HD newscasts in February 2020.

By the end of 2019, CW Eugene has been airing in 720p high definition over KMTR and KMCB (and all their associated repeater signals); however, KTCW (and its associated repeater signals) continued to air the subchannel in 4:3 standard definition, until it was upgraded by the end of March 2020.[15][16][17]

Digital channels

The stations' digital signals are multiplexed:

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[1][18][19]
16.123.146.11080i16:9NBC16KMCBKTCWMain programming / NBC
16.223.246.2720pCW PlusKMCB-CWKTCW-CWCW Eugene
16.323.346.3480icometCometTVCometTVComet TV

Satellite stations
Station City of license1 Channels
RF / VC		 First air date Former callsigns ERP HAAT Facility ID Transmitter coordinates Transmitter location Public license information
KMCB Coos Bay 22 (UHF)
23 (PSIP)		 July 8, 1991 (1991-07-08) KMTZ (1991–2006)
KUCW (2006)[20]		 10 kW 179 m (587 ft) 35183 43°23′38.4″N 124°8′0.3″W atop Noah Butte Profile
CDBS
KTCW Roseburg 36 (UHF)
46 (PSIP)		 April 1992 (1992-04)2 KMTX-TV (1992–2006)[21] 38.9 kW 109 m (358 ft) 35187 43°12′21.5″N 123°21′53.9″W atop Mount Nebo Profile
CDBS

Notes:

  • 1. Aside from their transmitters, KMCB and KTCW do not maintain any physical presence in their respective cities of license.
  • 2. The Broadcasting and Cable Yearbook says KTCW signed on April 8, while the Television and Cable Factbook says it signed on April 20.

Translators

The stations are rebroadcast on the following translators:

KMTR translators
Call sign Channel City of license[1]
K26NE-D26Florence
K31AE-D31Sutherlin
K35JH-D35London Springs
K48KC-D32Cottage Grove

KMCB translators
Call sign Channel City of license[20]
K15KF-D46Coos Bay
K28OD-D28Powers
gollark: These are designed to work best on general purpose CPUs - to prevent using dedicated hardware to accelerate bruteforce - and to have a tunable time requirement.
gollark: But this doesn't really mean much. Sanely designed systems now will be using stuff like scrypt/bcrypt/argon2.
gollark: It displays roughly okay.
gollark: I see.
gollark: It's not meaningful to just say "it can do 86970 passwords/second".

References
  1. "Digital TV Market Listing for KMTR". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved July 12, 2017.
  2. O'Steen, Kathleen (September 22, 2003). "The WB's Radical Genesis". Television Week: 14. Retrieved July 12, 2017.
  3. "WB 100+ Affiliates". Television Week: 18. September 22, 2003. Retrieved July 12, 2017.
  4. O'Steen, Kathleen (September 22, 2003). "Forging an Identity". Television Week: 20. Retrieved July 12, 2017.
  5. (Press release). The CW Network. May 18, 2006 http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news/2006/05/18/the-cw-announces-11-new-long-term-affiliation-agreements-21377/20060518cw01/. Retrieved July 12, 2017 – via Futon Critic. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  6. "Clear Channel Agrees to Sell Television Station Group to Providence Equity Partners (press release)". Clear Channel Communications. April 20, 2007. Archived from the original on April 25, 2007. Retrieved October 9, 2015.
  7. "KMTR-TV plans digital transition on February 17th". KMTR. February 6, 2009. Archived from the original on February 10, 2009. Retrieved October 9, 2015.
  8. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-09-08. Retrieved 2008-12-11.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  9. "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and the Second Rounds" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-08-29. Retrieved 2012-03-24.
  10. Malone, Michael (April 11, 2013). "Sinclair to Acquire Fisher Stations for $373 Million". Broadcasting & Cable. Retrieved April 12, 2013.
  11. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-02-02. Retrieved 2013-04-24.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  12. "CDBS Print". licensing.fcc.gov.
  13. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2013-06-15. Retrieved 2013-06-04.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  14. "Sinclair Broadcast Group Closes On Fisher Communications Acquisition". All Access. August 8, 2013. Retrieved August 8, 2013.
  15. "Digital TV Market Listing for KMTR". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved December 9, 2019.
  16. "Digital TV Market Listing for KMCB". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved December 9, 2019.
  17. "Digital TV Market Listing for KTCW". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved December 9, 2019.
  18. "Digital TV Market Listing for KMCB". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved December 4, 2019.
  19. "Digital TV Market Listing for KTCW". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved December 4, 2019.
  20. "Digital TV Market Listing for KMCB". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved April 4, 2018.
  21. "Digital TV Market Listing for KTCW". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved April 5, 2018.
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