fortmill said:
Wouldnt the height of the building make it possible? At the time ( early 80's ) the Cavalier was one of the tallest hotels in Virginia Beach. Plus they had a sister hotel across the street up a rather steep hill. I was only a pre-teen at the time so I don't have a clue how the hotel pulled it off but they somehow did. I remember my dad making a comment at the time how WRAL's newscasts were "much better" than Norfolk's which wasn't much a surprise even then. While most markets always tried their best to seem like major market even when they aren't, Tidewater ( ok Hampton Roads ), WVEC, WTAR-WTKR, and WAVY at the time seemed to be trying to do the "small town" look ( I think it was Norfolk about ten years who actually didn't want to be included in those Neilsen "overnight-big city" ratings, only WGNT wanted to be a part of it ).
Plus going back to the Cavalier, I remember watching "Eyewitness News" on WTVD. The name "Eyewitness News" had always been somewhat taboo in Tidewater. WAVY BOMBED with it and WTKR tried to bring it back but failed so badly it lasted less than a year before WTKR went with NewsChannel 3.
Oddly about a year later we stayed at the rather low budget ( and now defunct ) three story Tides Motor Lodge. They only offered three channels ( WAVY, WVEC and WTKR ) and two of them WVEC and WTKR came in quite poorly. And even in the 80s, all of their TVs were in wonderful black & white.
But I did manged to pick up both WBOC and WMDT from the Maryland eastern shore on the beach itself in Virginia Beach.