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Long Lake NY-Cable Reception of Albany TV Stations

J

jiminCT

Guest
Does anyone know how the Long Lake Charter system is picking up the Albany stations? Its about 100 miles as the crow flies...
 
Believe it or not, Long Lakes Cable system is getting the A-S-T market over the air. They have this 100 foot + tower that looks like its going to fall over with stacked arrays (4 - 10 or greater element antennas) to pick up the distant signal. Be interesting what they will do with analog going dark soon. Digital signals will be lower in power, WTEN is remaining with their UHF (26) signal. Will they get anything that does not lock up?
 
I have been wondering, myself, how the conversion to digital is going to affect summer homes in remote areas such as the Adirondacks. Many people don't want to pay a year around fee for cable or satellite. They don't find television that important in their camps and just put up antennas to recieve snowy signals from Watertown, Utica, Syracuse, Plattsburg, or where ever. I bet a lot of these people haven't given any thought to anaolog being turned off. When they get to their summer homes next spring there will be no TV at all. Unless the laws of physics have changed since my days of working in UHF I doubt any off air signals will penetrate the mountains even if they think to bring along a converter box. I heard that WKTV's digital signal does make it to Old Forge but haven't seen it myself.
 
We have talked about the dilemma of WPTZ moving their transmitter to Vermont...and how St. Lawrence and Franklin Counties will be effected. Seems like the Adirondack TV viewers who were used to using their antennas are going to have a heck of time getting anything.

I think with rural cable operators like DWS and Chain Lakes (who dont have fiber networks), they are going to have to have some issues...either using PT24 for WNBC, WABC, and WSEE....or getting some kind of retransmission agreement with one of the DBS providers.
I cant imagine Charter is going to pick up an HDTV signal from Albany over 100 miles away.
 
jiminCT said:
We have talked about the dilemma of WPTZ moving their transmitter to Vermont...and how St. Lawrence and Franklin Counties will be effected. Seems like the Adirondack TV viewers who were used to using their antennas are going to have a heck of time getting anything.

I think with rural cable operators like DWS and Chain Lakes (who dont have fiber networks), they are going to have to have some issues...either using PT24 for WNBC, WABC, and WSEE....or getting some kind of retransmission agreement with one of the DBS providers.
I cant imagine Charter is going to pick up an HDTV signal from Albany over 100 miles away.
Click to expand...

I wonder if this is an opportunity for WCWF Saranac Lake (if/when it ever comes back to life) to broadcast 5 SD channels (CBS/NBC/ABC/Fox/ion) to cover the Adirondacks with what will now be 'first' TV service.

Which TV market is Saranac Lake actually in?
 
tvlurker said:
Which TV market is Saranac Lake actually in?
Click to expand...

According to Wikipedia, the Village of Saranac Lake sits on the border of Franklin and Essex counties. Both counties are considered part of the Burlington-Plattsburgh DMA.

There used to be a handy TV market map at http://ekb.dbstalk.com/TVMarkets/Maps/new_york.gif

But it appears that server is going through an overhaul of some sort, and that map isn't available. I could have sworn I saved it on my own computer, but I couldn't find it. Next best thing is Arbitron's radio market map -- which includes the outlines of the TV markets on it.
http://www.arbitron.com/downloads/Arb_US_Metro_Map_08.pdf

It's a large file and kinda slow because it redraws every time you zoom or move it -- so if you ever use this map, just use the custom zoom tool to immediately zoom in on the region you're interested in (rather than clicking the regular zoom-in button 15 times).
 
THE_KNICKMAN said:
Believe it or not, Long Lakes Cable system is getting the A-S-T market over the air. They have this 100 foot + tower that looks like its going to fall over with stacked arrays (4 - 10 or greater element antennas) to pick up the distant signal. Be interesting what they will do with analog going dark soon. Digital signals will be lower in power, WTEN is remaining with their UHF (26) signal. Will they get anything that does not lock up?
Click to expand...

I would think that if they cannot get a signal from WTEN-DT (26), they could have a better shot of getting co-owned full-time satellite WCDC-DT (36) from high atop Mt. Greylock in Adams, MA. If worse comes to worse, they can always use satellite to get the A-S-T stations for the time being until a more permanant arrangement could be made (maybe a multiple hop microwave link). I think most DT's are going to have substantial power increases to compensate for the loss of coverage, compared to the old analog footprints.
 
The thought occurred to me that the town of Johnsburg, (North Creek) has 3 translators on Gore Mt. I believe they are on the private site at Barton's mines adjacent to the ski area. What could be done is this site be used as a receive point for Charter, hop the signal on microwave to Blue mountain and on to Long Lake. One should note that Long Lake is avery small community, maybe 300 to 400 customers at best. Quite an investment to say the least, Other services such as broadband would not be feasable since the telephone company; Frontier telephone already offers DSL. In the end it might be more practical if the cable system went away and everyone had either Dish network or Directv. Subscribers of these get the A-S-T market in Hamilton county
 
The thought occurred to me that the town of Johnsburg, (North Creek) has 3 translators on Gore Mt bringing in A-S-T stations. I believe they are on the private site at Barton's mines adjacent to the ski area. What could be done is this site be used as a receive point for Charter, hop the signal on microwave to Blue mountain and on to Long Lake. One should note that Long Lake is avery small community, maybe 300 to 400 customers at best. Quite an investment to say the least, Other services such as broadband would not be feasable since the telephone company; Frontier telephone already offers DSL. In the end it might be more practical if the cable system went away and everyone had either Dish network or Directv. Subscribers of these get the A-S-T market in Hamilton county
 
I cant imagine that a microwave link even exists for CATV in upstate NY anymore. Considering Charter is in Long Lake...I dont think they will get any help via satellite (Directv or Dish) or Time Warners fiber link.
 
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