Central Independent Television

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Central Independent Television

Based in	Birmingham,Nottingham
Broadcast area	Midlands
Launched	1 January 1982
The Central cake: Central TV logo 1985-1998
Closed	Became Carlton Central in 1999, but lost on-air identity 27 October 2002 (known as ITV1 Central before regional programming only)
Replaced	ATV
Website	itvregions.com/central
Owned by	ITV plc

Central Independent Television (commonly referred to as Central and officially known as ITV Central Ltd) is the British Independent Television company that succeeded ATV on 1 January 1982. The main news programme for the region is Central Tonight. On 29 December 2006 the name of the company was changed to ITV Central Ltd.

Contents 1 History 2 Launch 3 Programme production 4 Carlton and ITV plc 5 External links

[edit] History

During the 1970s, ATV had often been criticised by various bodies within its constituency as having little interest in the area as its main studios were still located at Elstree, particularly when it came to local news which was felt by viewers in the east of its region as having a strong Birmingham slant (this being the production base of ATV in the Midlands).

This was addressed partially by the company in 1980 in its application for the Midlands franchise to run from 1982 with plans for a second major facility in the area (to be based in Nottingham) and as part of the IBA plan for the contract to be a dual region, they would provide separate news coverage for both the East and the West Midlands. As part of this the name of the company would be changed from ATV Network Limited to ATV Midlands Limited, thus reinforcing its new regional focus.

The Independent Broadcasting Authority accepted the belief that ATV Midlands Ltd planned to take a more local identity: However they did not accept that the changes proposed would be significant enough to identify the new ATV from its predecessor. They awarded the contract to ATV Midlands Limited on the basis that further changes were to be implemented;

• Lew Grade's Associated Communications Corporation would divest 49% of its shareholding in the company to a mixture of local businesses, local public bodies and local residents via a share issue.

• Significant changes had to be made at board level.

• The registered office would move from London (Great Cumberland Place) to the studios at Birmingham.

• That when the new facilities at Nottingham were operational the existing studios at Elstree would be closed, finally breaking the link ATV had with London since 1955.

To signify these major changes, the IBA stipulated one more condition: that ATV would have to change its name to symbolise that it was effectively a new company.

The name chosen was Central Independent Television after the company had tried to register itself as Central Television, only to find another company with that name. It is widely believed that an enterprising businessman had registered the name in the hope of obtaining royalties.

[edit] Launch

The name and the company logo, originally an sphere opening up to reveal a bright light before closing again (said to represent the new Central coming from the old ATV before the two became one representing both freshness and continuity) was designed by the agency Minale Tattersfield, the same company who created the Thames Television waterfront ident.

When Central launched, its region was subdivided into two sub-regions; one for the West Midlands (with studios in Birmingham), and one for the East Midlands (with studios in Nottingham). Until the new Nottingham studios at Lenton Lane were ready, Central operated from a converted facility on an industrial estate in the city. Operations at Nottingham were to be staffed by employees originally based at Elstree: This led to arguments between management and unions as some staff did not wish to move whilst others objected to the personal cost of relocating. This led to industrial action and for the first few weeks of transmission the service from Nottingham was replaced by that from Birmingham.

There are few differences between the subregions, but each has its own news service and advertisements. This led to the BBC also producing two news programmes (Midlands Today for the West and East Midlands Today for the East).

Although a new identity to viewers, Central enjoyed the benefit of effectively being a long-established ITV company. For a short while, some shows made by ATV prior to the changeover were transmitted with a static Central caption leading into an animated ATV ident, thus creating confusion to viewers and undermining any attempt by Central to impress its own identity. The much-vaunted share issue had a poor reception (the country was in recession at the time) and resulted in a large minor shareholding being obtained by businessman Robert Maxwell.

[edit] Programme production

The company though performed strongly on programming carrying on several ATV shows, most notably the soap-opera Crossroads. Original programming included the comedy-drama Auf Wiedersehen Pet and the game shows The Price is Right & Blockbusters. Aside from continuing the populist theme of ATV the company also produced the heavyweight drama Walter for the first evening of Channel Four. A critically-acclaimed drama it starred Ian McKellen in the eponymous lead role as a handicapped man adjusting to life after the death of his mother. The company also produced the detective drama Inspector Morse in association with Zenith Productions, a subsidiary of Carlton Communications who, as Carlton Television would purchase Central in 1994. Like ATV, Central was a large contributor to programmes for schools and colleges on the ITV network.

It also scored a failure with the 1986 comedy Hardwicke House, about an anarchic comprehensive school. The first two episodes received so much public condemnation that the remainder were never aired and were eventually wiped at a cost of £100,000.

Central's presentation improved and the branding and continuity became more refined, with the introduction of the Central cake, a multi-coloured globe.

Whereas local news had been a constant criticism of ATV, Central invested enormous funds and time into it. As well as the east and west regions, in 1989 a third sub-region covering the South Midlands was created. With a news studio in Abingdon (near Oxford), Central News South was at the time of its creation the most automated news operation in the country. The service was launched on 9th January 1989, the opening night being fraught with technical problems. Presenters Wesley Smith and Anne Dawson co-presented the main programme, and were the longest-serving co-presenters of any ITV regional news programme, until Dawson's departure in 2003 to become a college lecturer. Anne was replaced as main presenter by Hannah Stewart-Jones, formerly of Channel TV.

The BBC finally responded to the creation of Central News South in 2000 by creating a sub-opt-out that is broadcast to Oxfordshire, eastern Wiltshire, and parts of Buckinghamshire.

Central News South was again a pioneer of new technology when, in the Spring of 2001, state-of-the-art Quantel digital video servers and edit suites were installed, along with a complete re-fit of camera and VTR equipment. This meant that Central South was at the forefront of digital news-gathering in regional news.

However, it was announced on 6 June 2006 that Central News South's existence as a news region was to end after 17 years when it would merge its operations with Meridian West's output, forming a new news region named ITV Thames Valley and a new news programme, Thames Valley Tonight. Originally, the changes were supposed to make over 40 workers redundant from Central News South, however this was later reduced to 20 [1]. The last edition was broadcast on Sunday 3rd December, although there was a pan-regional Central News broadcast the following morning during GMTV. At the same time, ITV West's (legally HTV West) broadcast footprint was expanded to cover Cheltenham and Gloucestershire from the West's Bristol studios, while Herefordshire re-joined Central News West from Birmingham.

[edit] Carlton and ITV plc

Carlton Television had owned a stake in Central since the early eighties (before Carlton became an ITV Franchisee in its own right). In 1994, Central was completely bought by Carlton and on 6 September 1999 was rebranded as Carlton Central, though the registered company name remained Central Independent Television Limited. The new identity, produced by Lambie Nairn was used across all of Carlton's franchises; Carlton London, Westcountry Television and HTV

With the merger of Carlton and Granada on 2 February 2004, the brand became ITV1 Central. Central Independent Television is currently owned by ITV plc.

In February 2004, ITV plc announced plans to close and sell the Lenton Lane production centre, located in Nottingham. Following the closure of the Lenton Lane studios, a new news-gathering centre was established in the city, but production of Central News East moved to Central's Birmingham studio in Spring 2005. The former studio complex is now part of The University of Nottingham and is known as 'King's Meadow Campus'. It still maintains one Studio (Studio 7), and this is rented out to television and film Companies, generating income for the University.

In October 2004, ITV plc closed Central's presentation/transmission department, moving transmission to the Northern Transmission Centre in Leeds. Many viewers and workers from the British television industry believe this to have been a mistake, claiming that Central had the most professional presentation within the ITV network, and pioneered many technologies and techniques years before they would be adopted on a wider scale. However, the role of presentation and transmission at Birmingham had been significantly reduced after Network presentation was centralised to LNN in London in 2002 and so there was an inevitability that this function would be moved out. CITV (Children's ITV), which had been presented from Central's Birmingham studios since 1983, was also re-homed to Granada's studios in Manchester, with all content pre-recorded and with out-of vision presentation.

[edit] External links

• ITV Central at itvlocal.com
• Interior and exterior photos of the original home of Central studios, Broad Street
• Tiswas Online - Tiswas was a popular Saturday morning children's programme produced by ATV / Central.
• Ident on Central branding