Most interesting hotel/hospital lineups

[crainbebo]

I can understand that for Caribbean cruises...they usually set sail out of Miami. But what about the cruise ships that go from Seattle to Alaska? Do they get any TV on those ships? I doubt it, but who knows.
WNBC was part of the PrimeTime 24 C-Band service for a while. Thus, the Missouri hotel had WNBC. The C-Band feed, carried on GE Americom 1, transponder 6, was known as "NBC America" for a while and had separate commercials from the NY feed, and *may* have preempted local news?
But in 2002, WNBC was also on DirecTV and Dish Network's out of market affiliates list.

 

[TriangleTriadMediaNews]

I can understand that for Caribbean cruises...they usually set sail out of Miami. But what about the cruise ships that go from Seattle to Alaska? Do they get any TV on those ships? I doubt it, but who knows.
WNBC was part of the PrimeTime 24 C-Band service for a while. Thus, the Missouri hotel had WNBC. The C-Band feed, carried on GE Americom 1, transponder 6, was known as "NBC America" for a while and had separate commercials from the NY feed, and *may* have preempted local news?
But in 2002, WNBC was also on DirecTV and Dish Network's out of market affiliates list.

For awhile the entire fleet was using the Denver locals for all ships (even east coast based ones). No idea if they've picked up Seattle or LA locals for west coast cruises, or if the entire fleet is using Miami.

 

[davideduardo]

I can understand that for Caribbean cruises...they usually set sail out of Miami.

I believe there are actually more departures from San Juan than from Miami. Puerto Rico is on the Caribbean, but Miami is not and you lose two days getting there and returning.

They certainly do not use the San Juan TV stations, though.

 

[ftballfan]

I believe there are actually more departures from San Juan than from Miami. Puerto Rico is on the Caribbean, but Miami is not and you lose two days getting there and returning.

They certainly do not use the San Juan TV stations, though.

Miami is a better port of call for the western Caribbean (Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Jamaica, Cayman Islands, Cancun/Cozumel) than San Juan

 

[davideduardo]

Miami is a better port of call for the western Caribbean (Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Jamaica, Cayman Islands, Cancun/Cozumel) than San Juan

Then it comes down to an evaluation of the destinations. The Bahamas, the Turks & Caicos and the Caymans really have no local attractions, while the Greater and Lesser Antilles and the ABC Islands have varied and interesting things to see and do. The Western Caribbean destinations are more an excuse to have a floating party, while the Eastern Caribbean ones have much more in the way of unique shore activities and sights.

For several decades, I would visit one of those destinations every few weekends. There was never a shortage of interesting and fun things to do.

Back on topic, when did cruise ships start to have satellite real time TV? And do they, like cable systems, pay carriage fees?

 

[hamster]

Back on topic, when did cruise ships start to have satellite real time TV? And do they, like cable systems, pay carriage fees?

Better yet when did the cruise ships even get TV ??? My late aunt & uncle took a cruise to the Bahamas in 1972. I was watching one of their old super 8 films about ten years ago not long before they passed of this trip. One scene was taken in their cabin at sea. NO TV or radio in the room but hey they did allow smoking. According to them when they took that trip the cruise ship not only did not have TV but no radio for the guests either. Come to think of it I seem to remember an old episode of The Love Boat when someone for some reason had asked Julie the cruise director about TV only to be told that there was no TV anywhere on the ship. This sort of thing reminds me of the bread & breakfast my cousin runs in Northern Virginia. NO TV in sight and the radio ?? Only SiriusXM is played no local radio is allowed to be played there. My cousin says the rule is there to give his out of town guests ( mostly from DC, Baltimore and sometimes Richmond and Pittsburgh ) an "oasis" away from the gloom & doom.

 

[newsmark]

Back on topic, when did cruise ships start to have satellite real time TV? And do they, like cable systems, pay carriage fees?

I'll bet they're treated more like customers of some satellite company rather than a cable company unto themselves.

The cruises I've been on, all Holland America, just had a handful of channels. CNN International, TNT, ESPN, Cartoon Network, maybe 1 more I can't think of. No local stations or Big 4 of any kind.

 

[ohdxer]

Back during the summer of 1992, I remember staying one night at a Holiday Inn motel in Hazard, Kentucky. Even though there was a local cable tv system in Hazard, the hotel had its own satellite dish. It carreied the local CBS affiliate WYMT-57 and KET affiliate WKHA-35. It also carried the ABC affiliate WXYZ-7 and the NBC affiliate WDIV-4 from Detroit.

Then in 2006, I was staying at the same hotel again. Only this time it carried the local cable tv system. It carried the ABC affiliate WTVQ-36 from Lexington, CBS affiliates WYMT-57 from Hazard and WKYT-27 from Lexington, NBC affiliates WCYB-5 from Bristol and WLEX-18 from Lexington, Fox affiliate WDKY-56 from Danville, and KET affiliate WKHA-35 from Hazard.

Also of interest is that the cable tv system at that motel carried WGN-9 from Chicago and WPIX-11 from New York City. It also carried the local newscasts from WGN and WPIX.

 

[crainbebo]

Odd that they got WXYZ and WDIV...those were on the Anik E2 satellite! They must have had a gray-market subscription. Not sure why they didn't take PT24 East (with WXIA, WRAL and WABC). Those would be on time with the CBS station.

 

[ftballfan]

Back during the summer of 1992, I remember staying one night at a Holiday Inn motel in Hazard, Kentucky. Even though there was a local cable tv system in Hazard, the hotel had its own satellite dish. It carreied the local CBS affiliate WYMT-57 and KET affiliate WKHA-35. It also carried the ABC affiliate WXYZ-7 and the NBC affiliate WDIV-4 from Detroit.

Then in 2006, I was staying at the same hotel again. Only this time it carried the local cable tv system. It carried the ABC affiliate WTVQ-36 from Lexington, CBS affiliates WYMT-57 from Hazard and WKYT-27 from Lexington, NBC affiliates WCYB-5 from Bristol and WLEX-18 from Lexington, Fox affiliate WDKY-56 from Danville, and KET affiliate WKHA-35 from Hazard.

Also of interest is that the cable tv system at that motel carried WGN-9 from Chicago and WPIX-11 from New York City. It also carried the local newscasts from WGN and WPIX.

So no FOX at all in 1992?

 

[ftballfan]

On Saturday night I stayed at the Baymont Inn in Traverse City, and it had a lineup based off the local Charter Cable lineup (with some channels removed, added, and/or moved around), but the actual source is likely DirecTV. A couple of odd things:
1. The CW affiliate on the system was WCWF from Green Bay (!!!) and not WDCW, WPIX, or the default CW+ feed
2. The system was mostly in SD, with the only HD channels being RT and NHK World, along with an infomercial channel
3. WCWF's picture was higher quality than any of the local stations (some of the locals were borderline unwatchable)

 

[hamster]

I wonder if the hotel chains themselves have gave any thought in having their own TV system nationwide say for example a Holiday Inn in Vermont would have the same lineup as a Marriott in Florida or a Days Inn in Nevada. Local stations ?? They will be replaced by a national feed of the networks. Local news & weather ?? The Weather Channel will take care of the weather but local news ?? I know that most of us think its cool to watch THEIR local TV but lets face it...the average Joe would not care and besides all the channels no matter what part of the country would be on the same channel. I'm just surprised the hotels haven't done this.

 

[seatownmedia]

Generally, hotels don't give much thought to their tv lineups. (I recently stayed at the Ramada-SeaTac and none of the local channels were being shown. Called front desk and they said they were looking into it but couldn't solve the problem until the next day, effectively not providing the big 4 networks.) However, they would be smart to pay attention to this. Think about it, when one stays at a hotel, other than going out for dinner, there is generally nothing else to do than turn on the tv.

 

[hamster]

Generally, hotels don't give much thought to their tv lineups. (I recently stayed at the Ramada-SeaTac and none of the local channels were being shown. Called front desk and they said they were looking into it but couldn't solve the problem until the next day, effectively not providing the big 4 networks.) However, they would be smart to pay attention to this. Think about it, when one stays at a hotel, other than going out for dinner, there is generally nothing else to do than turn on the tv.

Thats true. When one does stay at a hotel/motel other than going out for dinner or whatever the only thing to do is watch TV. Of course usually the channels people watch are usually stuff like HBO, Showtime, ESPN, CNN or The Weather Channel. Earlier this year I stayed at a hotel in Colorado Springs. The party I was with had wanted to get the weather forecast. Told him that Colorado Springs has their own local TV newscasts but he called the front desk to find out what channel is The Weather Channel instead of waiting for KRDO or KKTV instead.

 

[GuyfromYTown]

I stayed at a Ramada Inn in Niagara Falls, Ontario Easter Weekend 2001. Here is the Channel lineup:
0-Information
1-Games
2-WGRZ NBC Buffalo
4-WIVB CBS Buffalo
5-CBLT CBC Toronto
6-CIII Global Toronto
7-WKBW ABC Buffalo
8-WUTV Fox Buffalo
9-CFTO CTV Toronto
11-CHCH Hamilton
15 Headline News
And that's it! It was that sparse.

 

[crainbebo]

I think we've got a winner for smallest hotel cable lineup, and one with the least cable networks (ONE!) I'm surprised they didn't carry other Canadian cable networks. TSN, YTV, Comedy, The Movie Network and Family Channel (Canada) should have been on that lineup, at least!
A hotel that can't offer its customers any of the networks is one to stay away from. When I'm in a motel, I spend more time watching ABC/NBC/CBS than TBS/USA/ESPN/TWC.

 

[umfan]

I stayed at a Knights Inn north of Los Angeles last fall, and they had HBO and ESPN direct with the rest of the lineup all local including the many subchannels available in that market. Considering there wasn't a cable company involved, they had a lot of available channels.

 

[GuyfromYTown]

I think we've got a winner for smallest hotel cable lineup, and one with the least cable networks (ONE!) I'm surprised they didn't carry other Canadian cable networks. TSN, YTV, Comedy, The Movie Network and Family Channel (Canada) should have been on that lineup, at least!
A hotel that can't offer its customers any of the networks is one to stay away from. When I'm in a motel, I spend more time watching ABC/NBC/CBS than TBS/USA/ESPN/TWC.

Looking back at that, the hotel didn't offer CityTV, or even TVO (Canada's true equivalent to PBS). and those were easy to pick up in the Niagara region WITH A CONVERSION VAN ANTENNA(TVO was on analog UHF 19, although I doubt I would pick up CityTV's channel 57 signal).

 

[itsTheRolyPoly]

This is probably the wrong thread for this post and I apologize but this is not a hotel lineup, but rather a hospital lineup. I was in a hospital here in the Miami area for visiting (won't say what and where for safety reasons unless people ask) and here's the lineup that I looked up and found...

4 - WFOR 4 (CBS Miami)
5 - N/A
6 - WTVJ 6 (NBC Miami)
7 - WSVN 7 (FOX Miami; wasn't working for some reason)
8 - WGEN 8 (AZA Miami)
9 - N/A
10 - WPLG 10 (ABC Miami)
11 - WLTV 23 (UNI Miami)
12 - N/A
13 - WSCV 51 (TMD Miami)
14 - N/A
15 - WJAN 41 (Spanish Ind Miami)
16 - Bravo
17 - CNN
18 - N/A
19 - USA Network
20 - TBS
21 - TNT
22 - Channel wasn't working
23 - OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network
24 - Pop
25 - MLB Network
26 - N/A
27 - Discovery
28 - HLN
29 - FOX News
30 - Nicktoons
31 - N/A
32 - Not working channel
33 - N/A
34 - TLC
35 - WPBT 2 (PBS Miami)
36 - Animal Planet

Again, if its in the wrong place, I apologize. I just wanted to post this since I was able to see this in a hospital. There are hospital lineups too you know, not just hotels. Great reminder to think about so that hospital lineups are talked about as well, not just ones from hotels/motels.

 

[crainbebo]

Odd how this hospital put WPBT way down at 35, and everything else at the top. Couldn't use channel 2?
I have visited Overlake Hospital in Bellevue several times (family member had cancer). From what I noticed throughout my four or five trips in 2013, they had an in-house movie channel of some type. Movie would play, a blue screen would appear with the movie title, date and actors/actresses, plus how long was left before the show. Then the next movie would begin. This was on channel 19 of a system that took cable networks off DirecTV. Definitely not from DirecTV's PPV.