Looking at the Comcast lineup for the area, I am guessing it was originally a different system, and must have just been taken over by Comcast. The reason I say this is because none of their digital or HD channels go with that of Comcast, and it just looks very different. Also, does this mean Lewistown residents have options, or does it mean one part of the city is served by one system, and the other part another?
I live in Lewistown. This isn't as simple as it looks when you go to Zap2it.
Nowhere do you have a choice in provider. There are actually 3 providers in the 17044 zip code area, which is Lewistown. There are actually 4 cable systems in the immediate Lewistown area.
In the Boroughs of Lewistown and Burnham (17009), as well as Yeagertown (17099), the cable provider is Comcast (Lewistown). This system was owned by TCI, and has mostly the channel numbers from TCI. Because Comcast was not a factor in the Altoona/Johnstown/State College region until the Adelphia purchase, they never changed the channel numbers to the Comcast numbers, and the system was long neglected. It's a 550MHz system, and is mostly run out of State College, not Harrisburg. It just got HD channels in 2013, and has them in the 600's instead of the 800's where they're typically found because of the PPV channels being there. In former TCI markets where this grid is still used, HD channels ended up in the 100's and 200's. The Bedford/Central City/Cresson/Gallitzin system was also bundled with this Lewistown system, but had the PPV channels moved, was upgraded much more quickly, and its HD is in the 800's.
TCI was the dominant cable provider in the Altoona/Johnstown DMA, but divested most of its systems here in 1998 to Fanch Communications. Mifflin County had two separate systems, the TCI system of Lewistown that had been upgraded and the eastern portion of Derry Township that was not. It was sold, and bundled with the systems of Altoona and Johnstown, as well as Clearfield. Fanch was quickly purchased by Charter Communications, and Charter operated them until 2004. Charter divested these systems, and any time you see Atlantic Broadband, these were systems that Charter deemed inferior. Charter left PA, MD and Western NY at this time, and also South Florida. Atlantic Broadband still operates in the eastern portion of Derry Township, has few digital channels, no HD, and is also part of the 17044 zip code, and has a Lewistown address, per the USPS.
The western portion of Mifflin County is served by the Comcast Reedsville system. This was inherited from Adelphia, is also a 550MHz system, but was assigned the Comcast channel numbers whenever State College got them. State College was formerly an Adelphia market.
Granville Township also has a 17044 zip code, and this is where Nittany Media operates. Granville Township is divided by the Juniata River. The western part is part of the Comcast system, the eastern part along PA 103 is part of Nittany Media.
So there are 4 systems, they're all inferior (Nittany Media's website is broken, but I saw at my father-in-law's house they added a lot of new HD channels), and you only get 1 of them wired to your house.
