The HTV West Thread

What would be the point in essentially downsizing a current region - surely the point in this should be how underserved the Grampian are is.

Or, more to the point, the fact that the population area is more dense in the West region --- so they deserve the current coverage, compared to the more sparse population in Scotland.

Thank god they dumped the HTV name. Should have done so years ago (indead, almost did..)

Put it this way, when you walk in to McDonalds, your not always trading with the parent company, it could be a franchise-JoBloggs Food (west) LTD- for example, but the foods branded McDonalds, the staff uniforms say McDonalds, it IS McDonalds as far as the consumer is concerned.

so why on earth should they call it HTV news just because thats who the staff are employed by?....its irrelevent! Its owned by carlton Communications, its branded ITV1 West of England. Loose the HTV.

As to one big west country, this is the only time ever that I agree 110% with Chris Kelly. Plain bonkers.

Chris, I'm confused by you now. You said you didn't want West and South West merged -- I agreed -- You then concurred again, everyone's happy. And now you're shouting again?

I never suggested downsizing the Grampian tv region. Referring to my "television consciousness" analogy -- where Truro and Trowbridge have very little in common, and nor do Newquay and Tewksbury, the various corners of the Grampian transmission area aren't so divided sociopolitically or culturally. There is a "north of Scotland" group feeling that justifies the transmission area, along with the economic barrier against providing the Western Isles or the Northern Isles with their own ITV region, a la Channel TV. Again, the Channel Islands are a very distinct area of the UK -- very separate to the South of England, hence their separation from Southern TV was justified. My only point was that Grampian news reporters have to cover a vast area and if a 5-hour journey time were the limit to their travels, it would be a very difficult working plan indeed.

Chris, I agreed with you. And I never suggested the idea in the first place.

I never shout, how dare you

I was just making a comment on your other Grampian point, to demonstrate why a five hour drive from one end of the region to the other is okay there ... but not down here.

Not a personal attack on you at all, was just making a point which you happened to give me a path to make the point with.

Surely Grampian must have reporters/colleagues/someone in Inverness or Stornoway or somewhere other than Aberdeen.

Just to let you know, Grampian and Scottish are split into many sub-regions or as SMG call them "micro-regions."

These "micro-regions" could be used so much better but for now, they are used solely for advertising.

You cannot eat micro-regions.

Nor can they be put in the toaster for a tasty snack

TV Dragon..."Like Grampian you mean? I'd like to see you get from Oban to Lerwick in 5 hours, or from Stornoway to Dundee in 5 hours, without using aircraft. I'd pay you good money to see you make those journeys by car and boat in under 8 or 10 hours.. "

Sorry to be pedantic, but Oban is in the STV region & does feature on Scotland Today once in a blue moon. I know for a fact that Tiree is also in the STV tranmission area, in which case Coll & Mull probably are too.

AFAIK Grampian starts on the NWest coast round about Ballachulish/Fort William.

Well, I'll take your word for it -- but you see my original point. It can't be many more miles further north of Oban that the Grampian TV region kicks in, and that's still a hell of a distance from the other 3 corners.

I know about the micro-regions too, and I'd never expect there to be the same pool of reporters all living in Aberdeen being despatched, on hours-long journeys to various corners of the region to report on stories. Of course there are reporters and teams in different towns and cities -- just like HTV, and all other regions. But it's still a massive region to technically cater for, to be thinking of -- to be providing reasonably fairly and proportionately for, and making sure the resources are in the appropriate points in all corners of the region too. So their networking skills still have to cover a wide area.

Nevertheless, I wouldn't expect this to be the same for ITV-1 in the West and South West, I don't think they should be joined, cos they're not the same, and everybody agrees, and everybody's happy!
Whose idea was that anyway..?

But Grampian really wasn't and isn't the point of this thread. Shall we return it to the real subject -- HTV West?

I think the welsh are secretly trying to take over the west! We were getting ITV1 Wales break bumpers on ITV1 West during Sister Act 2 on Saturday afternoon . Strangely, Wales don’t appear to use the break flashes, though the west does???? The next break was an ITV1 break bumper with flashes! Eh?

That's strange, are you watching on Sky Digital?

The reason why ITV1 HTV West has breakflashes is because it get it's ads played from ITV1 Meridian who also play out the ads for ITV1 Anglia and ITV1 Channel, hence the reason why ITV1 HTV West also has breakflashes.

Maybe it was all connected to the Meridian breakdown at the same time???