WXMI

WXMI
Grand Rapids/Kalamazoo/Battle Creek, Michigan
United States
City Grand Rapids, Michigan
Branding Fox 17 (general)
Fox 17 News (newscasts)
Slogan Our West Michigan
Channels Digital: 19 (UHF)
Virtual: 17 (PSIP)
Subchannels 17.1 Fox
17.2 Antenna TV
17.3 This TV
Translators W17DF-D 17 Muskegon
W42CB-D 42 Hesperia
17 Battle Creek
30 Kalamazoo
Affiliations Fox
Owner Tribune Broadcasting
(WXMI, LLC)
First air date March 18, 1982 (1982-03-18)
Call letters' meaning We're FoX MIchigan (callsign predates network by three years)
Former callsigns WWMA-TV (1982–1983)
Former channel number(s) Analog:
17 (UHF, 1982–2009)
Former affiliations Independent (1982–1987)
DT2:
The Tube (2006–2007)
Transmitter power 750 kW
Height 334 meters (1,096 ft)
Facility ID 68433
Transmitter coordinates 42°41′15″N 85°31′57″W / 42.68750°N 85.53250°W / 42.68750; -85.53250
Website fox17online.com

WXMI, virtual channel 17 (UHF digital channel 19), is a Fox-affiliated television station located in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The station is owned by the Tribune Broadcasting division of the Tribune Media Company. WXMI maintains studio facilities on Plaza Drive (near M-37) on the northern side of Grand Rapids, and its transmitter is located southwest of Middleville.

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital channel is multiplexed:

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[1]
17.1 720p 16:9 FOX17DT Main WXMI programming / Fox
17.2 480i 4:3 Antenna Antenna TV
17.3 This-TV This TV

From August 2006 to September 2007, The Tube aired on the station's second digital subchannel. In July 2010, the station reactivated the 17.2 digital subchannel to carry This TV, which moved to 17.3 on December 9 in anticipation of the December 31 launch of Antenna TV.

Analog-to-digital conversion

WXMI shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 17, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.[2] The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 19,[3] using PSIP to display WXMI's virtual channel as 17 on digital television receivers.

Translators

In addition to its main signal, the station also operates two translators, mainly to provide clear service of the station to lakeshore cities with varying terrain blocking reception of the main signal, and to address interference in farther portions of the market by sister station WGN-TV from Chicago, which also broadcasts its digital signal on UHF channel 19. Two additional transmitters in the southern part of the market, officially classed as WXMI digital repeaters, serve the direct Kalamazoo area on channel 30 from the tower of WGVU-TV's Kalamazoo satellite WGVK, along with a second repeater licensed to Battle Creek on channel 17 transmitting from the city's south side; all four translators carry WXMI and its subchannel services, and all map via PSIP to channel 17. This means it is possible for a television in the Grand Rapids market receiving an over-the-air signal to map out up to four different WXMI signals in its channel map.

W42CB channel 42 completed a flash-cut to digital-only broadcasting in November 2010. W52DB on analog channel 52 was replaced by a digital signal on channel 17 in December 2010. In late June 2011, W52DB calls became W17DF-D.[4]

Call letters Channel City of license Transmitter location
W17DF-D 17 Muskegon northeast of city and U.S. 31
W42CB-D 42 Hesperia south of village along M-120
WXMI 17 Battle Creek northeast of I-94 and M-294 interchange
WXMI 30 Kalamazoo WGVK's tower on the west side of Kalamazoo

History

WXMI logo used from 1999 to April 20, 2009.

The station signed on the air on March 18, 1982 as an independent station under the call sign WWMA. The call letters are said to have stood for "We're West Michigan Alternative". The station was originally owned by Heritage Broadcasting Company. Approximately a year after signing on, additional shareholders bought control of the station and changed the callsign to the current WXMI on August 15, 1983. The "XMI" at the time were said to stand for "EXtreme Michigan". In 1987, WXMI signed an affiliation deal to become the market's Fox affiliate; it joined the network on April 9, 1987 when Fox expanded its programming offerings to include primetime programming. In 1989, the station's stock was purchased by a New York-based company headed by Robert Dudley called Odyssey Television Partners.

Nine years later, WXMI was purchased by Indianapolis-based Emmis Communications, which traded the station with sister KTZZ in Seattle, Washington to Tribune Broadcasting in 1998 in exchange for FM station WQCD in New York City. In 2008, cartoons were dropped from WXMI's schedule with the discontinuance of 4KidsTV following a dispute between Fox and the block's lessee 4Kids Entertainment; the Saturday morning time period is currently split between the weekend edition of WXMI's morning newscast, and children's programming (either syndicated or from Fox's Xploration Station block) fulfilling the Federal Communications Commission's E/I guidelines.

Programming

Syndicated programming featured on WXMI includes The Steve Wilkos Show, Two and a Half Men, The Simpsons (which also airs first-run episodes as well as reruns) and Divorce Court. WXMI is an affiliate of the Detroit Lions Television Network which airs pre-season games as well as the weekly syndicated show The Ford Lions Report during the regular season. Since it is outside of the team's local blackout area, it also airs all regular season games produced by Fox.

News operation

On January 11, 1999, WXMI started its news department and launched the market's first primetime newscast at 10:00 p.m. It originally aired for 35 minutes on weeknights and for a half-hour on weekends. The program would expand to a full hour seven nights a week in 2004. On August 28, 2006, the station premiered the Fox 17 Morning News. Originally a two-hour-long broadcast, it expanded to four hours (running from 5:00-9:00 a.m.) on September 15, 2008. On April 17, 2009, WXMI became the first station in West Michigan to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition; at the time, NBC affiliate WOOD-TV and ABC affiliates WZZM (channel 13) and WOTV (channel 41) produced their newscasts in merely widescreen enhanced-definition (CBS affiliate WWMT, channel 3, became the second station in the market to upgrade to HD newscasts on April 16, 2011, followed by WOOD-TV/WOTV on October 22, 2011). On April 20, 2011 during the weekday morning show, the station officially unveiled a new logo, graphics, music package ("The Unexpected" by 615 Music), and set.

On September 21, 2009, WXMI debuted an hour-long newscast at 6 p.m. that competes against half-hour newscasts on WWMT, WOOD-TV, and WZZM and their national network evening newscasts.[5] On March 7, 2011, the station debuted an hour-long lifestyle program at weeknights 5 p.m. called The One Seven; the final broadcast of the program aired only five months later on August 19, 2011. It was hosted by Michele DeSelms and Tim Doty and featured lifestyle segments, art, entertainment stories, cooking segments and some local news.[6] The program was replaced by a traditional hour-long local newscast at 5:00 p.m. (which debuted without any promotion) on August 22, 2011. On March 2, 2013, WXMI debuted weekend morning newscasts, running for four hours from 5:00 to 9:00 a.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. The station added a nightly 11 p.m. newscast on June 2, 2014; a promo for the new newscast references the shift from the common Fox affiliate news tagline of "at 10 (o'clock) it's news, at 11 (o'clock) it's history," with the additional wording "we changed our mind." A 4 p.m. newscast will debut on September 8, 2014.[7]

Notable former on-air staff

References

  1. ↑ RabbitEars TV Query for WXMI
  2. ↑ List of Digital Full-Power Stations
  3. ↑ CDBS Print
  4. ↑ (PDF) http://licensing.fcc.gov/prod/cdbs/pubacc/Auth_Files/1298659.pdf. Retrieved December 17, 2010. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  5. ↑ WXMI-TV Fox 17 adds 6 p.m. newscast starting Sept. 21, MLive.com, September 10, 2009.
  6. ↑ Fox-17's 'One Seven' co-hosts Michelle DeSelms and Tim Doty ease into new afternoon show, The Grand Rapids Press, March 18, 2011.
  7. ↑ Kaczmarczyk, Jeffrey (May 22, 2014). "FOX 17 announces plans to air news at 11 p.m. in West Michigan". The Grand Rapids Press. Retrieved May 22, 2014.
  8. ↑ Dela Cruz, Jay (8 January 2013). "Ahmed Fareed joins Comcast SportsNet Bay Area". Comcast SportsNet Bay Area. Retrieved 26 September 2013.
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