WAPK-CD,

virtual channel In most telecommunications organizations, a virtual channel is a method of remapping the ''program number'' as used in H.222 Program Association Tables and Program Mapping Tables to a channel number that can be entered via digits on a receiver's ...

36 ( UHF digital channel 16), is a low-power, Class A

MeTV MeTV, an acronym for Memorable Entertainment Television, is an American broadcast television network owned by Weigel Broadcasting. Marketed as "The Definitive Destination for Classic TV", the network airs a variety of classic television program ...

- affiliated

television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity, such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the eart ...

licensed A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

to Kingsport, Tennessee, United States, serving the Tri-Cities area of

northeastern The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

and

southwestern The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

. Owned by the Glenwood Communications Corporation, it is

sister A sister is a woman or a girl who shares one or more parents with another individual; a female sibling. The male counterpart is a brother. Although the term typically refers to a family, familial relationship, it is sometimes used endearingly to r ...

to Cozi TV affiliate

WKPT-TV WKPT-TV (channel 19) is a television station licensed to Kingsport, Tennessee, United States, serving the Tri-Cities area as an affiliate of Cozi TV. It is owned by Glenwood Communications Corporation alongside low-power Class A MeTV affiliat ...

(channel 19) and several radio stations. All of the stations share studios on Commerce Street in downtown Kingsport, while WAPK-CD's transmitter is located on Holston High Point at

Holston Mountain Holston Mountain is a mountain ridge in Upper East Tennessee and southwest Virginia, in the United States. It is in the Blue Ridge Mountains part of the Appalachian Mountains. Holston Mountain is a very prominent ridge-type mountain in Tennesse ...

in the

Cherokee National Forest The Cherokee National Forest is a United States National Forest located in the U.S. states of Tennessee and North Carolina that was created on June 14, 1920. The forest is maintained and managed by the United States Forest Service. It encompasse ...

. Due to its low-power status, the broadcasting radius does not reach all of the Tri-Cities area. Therefore, the station is

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simulta ...

in 16:9

widescreen Widescreen images are displayed within a set of aspect ratios (relationship of image width to height) used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than t ...

standard definition Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...

on WKPT's second digital subchannel in order to reach the entire

market Market is a term used to describe concepts such as: *Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand *Market economy *Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market Geography *Märket, an ...

. This relay signal can be seen on UHF channel 32.4 (or virtual channel 19.2) from the same Holston High Point at Holston Mountain in the Cherokee National Forest transmitter facility.

History

WAPK began service on April 30, 1989 as W30AP identified on-air as "WAP-TV". Programming was standard

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

fare with classic television sitcoms, sports, old movies, and cartoons plus repeats of WKPT's newscasts. On January 16, 1995, WAP became a charter affiliate of

UPN The United Paramount Network (UPN) was an American broadcast television network that launched on January 16, 1995. It was originally owned by Chris-Craft Industries' United Television. Viacom (through its Paramount Television unit, which pr ...

. Shortly afterward, W30AP was renamed WAPK-LP in April 1995. In May 2002, the station attained Class A status and changed to the call sign WAPK-CA. In 2003, WAPK moved from UHF channel 30 to channel 36. WAPK became a

MyNetworkTV MyNetworkTV (unofficially abbreviated MyTV, MyNet, MNT or MNTV, and sometimes referred to as My Network) is an American commercial broadcast television syndication service and former television network owned by Fox Corporation, operated by its ...

affiliate at the network's inception on September 5, 2006. In recent years, WAPK has been carried on

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

Harlan, Kentucky Harlan is a home rule-class city in and the county seat of Harlan County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 1,745 at the 2010 census, down from 2,081 at the 2000 census. Harlan is one of three Kentucky county seats to share its name w ...

, which is within the

Knoxville Knoxville is a city in and the county seat of Knox County in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States census, Knoxville's population was 190,740, making it the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division and the state' ...

media market A media market, broadcast market, media region, designated market area (DMA), television market area, or simply market is a region where the population can receive the same (or similar) television and radio station offerings, and may also incl ...

. The station was issued its license for digital operation on October 10, 2014, at which point it changed its call sign to WAPK-CD. Following the announcement that WKPT-TV would lose its ABC affiliation to the DT2 subchannel of

WJHL-TV WJHL-TV (channel 11) is a television station licensed to Johnson City, Tennessee, United States, serving the Tri-Cities area as an affiliate of CBS and ABC. The station is owned by Nexstar Media Group, and maintains studios on East Main Street ...

, it was announced that much of WAPK's programming, including MyNetworkTV, would move to WKPT-TV, and that WAPK would switch to programming from a digital network, later revealed to be

, WJHL-DT2's former affiliation. The switch over took place on February 1, 2016. The station's fourth channel is expected to carry

Heroes & Icons Heroes & Icons (H&I) is an American digital broadcast television network owned by Weigel Broadcasting. Usually carried on the digital subchannels of its affiliated television station in most markets, the network airs classic television series fr ...

. After WKPT-TV dropped MyNetworkTV in favor of Cozi TV, the Laff affiliation was transferred from WAPK-CD's third subchannel to WKPT's third subchannel (which had previously carried Cozi TV); the move came as a result of Holston Valley Broadcasting opting to refocus WKPT and WAPK entirely around "nostalgia-based programming", stating that MeTV outrates ABC Tri-Cities in most time periods. The CD3 subchannel then subsequently became an affiliate of Bounce TV, a TV network targeting an African-American audiences.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is

multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource - a ...

Translators

The station can also be seen on these repeaters. The main signal on channel 16 is the origination for many of the cable companies that carry WAPK. Holston also uses the signal as the source for all of WAPK's channels via a series of ATSC receivers that directly feed the transmitters.

References

External links

* {{Other Tennessee Stations APK-CD MeTV affiliates Grit (TV network) affiliates Bounce TV affiliates Television channels and stations established in 1989 1989 establishments in Tennessee Low-power television stations in the United States Heroes & Icons affiliates