| Vancouver, Washington / Portland, Oregon | |
|---|---|
| Branding | PDX TV |
| Slogan | Totally Entertaining TV |
| Channels | Digital: 30 (UHF) Virtual: 49 (PSIP) |
| Translators | KUBN-LP 50 Bend (for others see article) |
| Affiliations | MyNetworkTV |
| Owner | Meredith Corporation |
| First air date | October 9, 1983 |
| Call letters' meaning | PDX = Portland's IATA airport code[1] |
| Sister station(s) | KPTV |
| Former channel number(s) | Analog: 49 (UHF, 1983-2009) Digital: 48 (UHF, 2004-2009) |
| Former affiliations | Independent (1983-1988) Fox (1988-2002) UPN (2002-2006) |
| Transmitter power | 1000 kW |
| Height | 513 m |
| Facility ID | 35460 |
| Website | www.kpdx.com |
KPDX is the MyNetworkTV-affiliate serving the Portland, Oregon metropolitan area. It broadcasts its digital signal on UHF channel 30. In addition, it is seen on channel 13 on most local cable TV systems.
The station is currently owned by Meredith Corporation in a duopoly with Fox affiliate KPTV (channel 12), and is licensed to Vancouver, Washington. Its transmitter is located in Portland. It runs a general entertainment format with sitcoms, talk shows, reality shows, court shows, cartoons, movies, and first-run shows.
KPDX's signal is simulcast in Bend on KUBN-LP, channel 50, making the station available in about two-thirds of the state.
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KPDX launched on October 9, 1983, as a general entertainment station, airing a number of cartoons, sitcoms, old movies, drama shows, and religious shows. It was originally licensed under the call letters KLRK, but the station changed to the present calls prior to launch.[2] The station was bought by First Media in the mid-1980s. Even though then-rival KPTV was easily the market's leading independent station, KPDX still received decent ratings.
KPDX gained the Fox Network affiliation on August 29, 1988, after KPTV disaffiliated from the network. The station began to add more talk and children's programs in the 1990s. For a while, KPDX ran a 10pm newscast produced by KOIN. The partnership with KOIN later ended, and in 2000, KPDX launched its own news operation, producing its own 10pm newscast. The station, along with WHNS in Greenville, South Carolina, was acquired by Meredith Corporation in 1997.
Meredith acquired KPTV in 2002 following a station swap with Fox Television Stations, Inc. in exchange for WOFL in Orlando, Florida (and its satellite WOGX in Ocala). This resulted in the first "duopoly" operation in the Portland TV market, and precipitated an affiliation switch on September 2 in which the market's Fox affiliation went to KPTV (the higher-rated station of the two), and the UPN affiliation went to KPDX. KPDX's news operation was merged into KPTV's newsroom (although KPTV's operation actually moved into KPDX's newer facility, located in Beaverton), and KPDX's existing 10pm newscast was cancelled. However, Fox's Saturday morning lineup remained on KPDX, where it continued to air under the title 4Kids TV until its shutdown on December 27, 2008.
On January 24, 2006, the UPN and WB networks announced they would merge into a new network, to be called The CW. The merger would take effect on-the-air in September 2006, and WB station KWBP (now KRCW-TV), owned by the Tribune Company, became the CW's Portland affiliate. One month later, Fox announced that it would form a new network, MyNetworkTV, and on March 9, 2006, it was announced that KPDX would switch affiliations to the new network.
KPDX dropped the UPN branding on April 1, 2006, by changing its name from UPN 49 to PDX 49, and adopted a new logo in the process. This change of branding had been planned before UPN's shutdown was announced, but the timing of the change was convenient for the upcoming affiliation switch. KPDX's move mirrored those implemented at future MyNetworkTV stations WDCA in Washington, D.C. (DCA 20) and KUTP in Phoenix (PHX 45), which began using the station's last three letters as station branding. KPDX is one of eight MyNetworkTV affiliates not to adopt the network's "blue TV" logo and/or branding style (the others being KCWX, KAUT, KARZ-TV, WSTR-TV, sister station KSMO-TV, WPME-TV, and Madison, Wisconsin's Digital subchannel of WISC-TV). Since joining MyNetworkTV, KPDX has become responsible for carrying Fox network programs whenever KPTV cannot in the event of an emergency.
On September 8, 2008, KPDX moved MyNetworkTV programming from 8-10 p.m. to 9-11 p.m., making it one of five MyNetworkTV stations at the time not to air the network programming in its normal 8-10 p.m. timeslot. (KEVU-LP in Eugene, KRON-TV in San Francisco, KQCA in Sacramento (which has since moved MyNetworkTV programming back to its normal 8-10 p.m. timeslot), and KMYQ (now KZJO) in Seattle were the others). Concurrent with the schedule change and in anticipation of the station's 25th anniversary, KPDX's on-air brand was modified from 'PDX 49' to 'PDX TV'.
After the analog television shutdown on June 12, 2009[3], KPDX moved its digital broadcasts to channel 30 [4] using PSIP to display KPDX's virtual channel as 49.
On June 12, 2009, at 9:00 a.m. (PDT), KPDX transferred its DTV signal from its temporary transmitter (on channel 48) to the channel 30 DTV transmitter that had just been vacated by its sister station, KPTV. At 9:30 a.m., KPDX turned off its analog transmitter.
As of April, 2011, US satellite provider DirecTV has yet to carry KPDX's High Definition signal, only the Standard Definition signal is carried.
On September 8, 2008, KPDX began airing a weeknight 8 p.m. newscast produced by KPTV; as such, KPTV is one of only a few Fox stations in the United States to produce a newscast for another station in the same market.
The 8 O'Clock News
(weeknights 8-9 p.m.)
KPDX features additional news personnel from KPTV. See that article for a complete listing.
KPDX is rebroadcast on the following network of translator stations.
South Lane Television combines the KPDX and KPTV signals on their channel 44 translator
When KPDX became a Fox affiliate in 1988, the station's signal was spotty in several areas around Portland. For KPDX to provide better signal coverage in these areas, several translator stations were activated.
The channel 14 and 18 translators signed on the air May 1, 1994. The channel 16 translator began in 1992 as an independent LPTV station, owned by Kenneth J. Seymour carrying programming from Main Street Television and The Opportunity Channel. Later in 1992 the station was acquired by KPDX, and became KPDX's translator. It was shut down in 1999 due to the loss of its transmitter site lease and duplication of signal by channel 14 in Camas. The license was returned to the FCC in 2002.
NOTE - By FCC mandate, Low Power stations on channels 52 through 69 must vacate those channels by December 31, 2011[5]
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