WLVT-TV

Allentown–Bethlehem–Easton, Pennsylvania United States
City	Allentown, Pennsylvania
Channels	Digital: 9 (VHF), shared with WBPH-TV, WFMZ-TV and WPPT[1] Virtual: 39
Branding	PBS 39
Programming
Affiliations	39.1: PBS 39.2: Create 39.3: France 24
Ownership
Owner	Lehigh Valley Public Media (Lehigh Valley Public Telecommunications Corp.)
Sister stations	WPPT
History
First air date	September 7, 1965 (58 years ago) (1965-09-07)
Former channel number(s)	Analog: 39 (UHF, 1965–2009) Digital: 62 (UHF, 2003–2009), 39 (UHF, 2009–2018)[2]
Former affiliations	NET (1965–1970)
Call sign meaning	Lehigh Valley Television
Technical information[3]
Licensing authority	FCC
Facility ID	36989
ERP	80.6 kW
HAAT	332.5 m (1,091 ft)
Transmitter coordinates	40°33′52″N 75°26′24″W / 40.56444°N 75.44000°W / 40.56444; -75.44000
Links
Public license information	Public file LMS
Website	wlvt.org

WLVT-TV (channel 39) is a PBS member television station in Allentown, Pennsylvania, United States. Owned by Lehigh Valley Public Media, it is a sister station to Philadelphia-licensed PBS member WPPT (channel 35). WLVT-TV's studios are located in the south side of Bethlehem, and its transmitter is located south of nearby Allentown atop South Mountain.

History

20th century

The station first signed on the air on September 7, 1965, as a member station of National Educational Television (NET), and eventually joined PBS at its inception in 1970. WLVT-TV is commonly known as PBS39, referring to the main virtual channel of 39.1.

The Lehigh Valley is part of the Philadelphia market, the fourth-largest television market in the United States. In recent years, WLVT has expanded its programming focus to the entire Philadelphia television market. It is carried by many cable providers in the area, including Comcast, Service Electric, RCN, Blue Ridge Cable, and others. WLVT-TV is also available throughout the region on the Philadelphia DirecTV and Dish Network feeds.

This gives WLVT one of the largest potential audiences in the country—6.7 million people in eastern Pennsylvania, western and southern New Jersey, and northern and central Delaware. However, the station's recent focus on the broader market means that it frequently competes with Philadelphia's main PBS member station, WHYY-TV (channel 12), one of the most-watched PBS stations in the country. To a lesser extent, it also competes with NJ PBS's two outlets in the market, WNJT and WNJS.

21st century

In 2011, WLVT-TV moved from its longtime studio on Mountain Drive North to a new studio facility, PPL Public Media Center, on the south side of Bethlehem. The new facility is adjacent to the ArtsQuest complex on the SteelStacks Campus, previously home to Bethlehem Steel.^[4] The new station is equipped with two large studios, where local productions, including Focus (a local magazine show), You Bet Your Garden (formerly on WHYY-FM), Scholastic Scrimmage, Faces of Jazz, and Behind the Guitar, are filmed.

WLVT also broadcasts PBS and American Public Television distributed programming.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's signal is multiplexed:

Analog-to-digital conversion

WLVT shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 39, on January 31, 2009. The station's digital signal relocated on its pre-transition UHF channel 62, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition, to its former analog-era UHF channel 39 for post-transition operations.^[6]