KXTU-LD (channel 57) is a low-power television station in

Colorado Springs, Colorado Colorado Springs is a home rule municipality in, and the county seat of, El Paso County, Colorado, United States. It is the largest city in El Paso County, with a population of 478,961 at the 2020 United States Census, a 15.02% increase since ...

, United States, serving

Southern Colorado South-Central Colorado is a region of the U.S. state of Colorado. It can be roughly defined by Chaffee County in the northwest, El Paso County in the northeast, Las Animas County in the southeast, and Conejos County in the southwest. Some notable ...

with programming from

The CW ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

. It is

owned and operated In the broadcasting industry, an owned-and-operated station (frequently abbreviated as an O&O) usually refers to a television or radio station owned by the network with which it is associated. This distinguishes such a station from an affiliate ...

by network majority owner

Nexstar Media Group Nexstar Media Group, Inc. is an American publicly traded media company with headquarter offices in Irving, Texas; Midtown Manhattan; and Chicago, Illinois. The company is the largest television station owner in the United States, owning 197 te ...

alongside

Fox Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

affiliate KXRM-TV (channel 21). Both stations share studios on Wooten Road in Colorado Springs, while KXTU-LD's transmitter is located on Cheyenne Mountain. 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, simultane ...

high definition High definition or HD may refer to: Visual technologies *HD DVD, discontinued optical disc format *HD Photo, former name for the JPEG XR image file format *HDV, format for recording high-definition video onto magnetic tape * HiDef, 24 frames-pe ...

on KXRM-TV's second

digital subchannel In broadcasting, digital subchannels are a method of transmitting more than one independent program stream simultaneously from the same digital radio or television station on the same radio frequency channel. This is done by using data compress ...

. This signal increases KXTU's broadcasting radius; KXTU did not convert to digital until 2010, and even in digital, its coverage area is effectively limited to

El Paso El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the seat of El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 23rd-largest city in the U.S., the s ...

and Pueblo counties.

History

The station signed on as KXTU-LP on November 5, 1999, as a

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 prod ...

affiliate under the brand of UPN57. When UPN left the air on September 17, 2006, KXTU switched to

, which was created by the merger of

The WB The WB Television Network (for Warner Bros., or the "Frog Network", for its former mascot, Michigan J. Frog) was an American television network launched on broadcast television on January 11, 1995, as a joint venture between the Warner Bros. ...

(which had been available in the market by way of

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

KWGN-TV KWGN-TV (channel 2) is a television station in Denver, Denver, Colorado, United States, airing programming from The CW. It is owned-and-operated station, owned and operated by network majority owner Nexstar Media Group alongside Fox Broadcasting ...

) and UPN. Unlike most other low-powered stations, KXTU is available to viewers on

DirecTV DirecTV (trademarked as DIRECTV) is an American multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital satellite service serving the United States. It ...

and

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, as well as on

cable systems Cable television is a system of delivering television broadcast programming, programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This ...

throughout southern Colorado. This is because under the retransmission consent portion of the must-carry rules, KXRM has the right to require cable and satellite providers to carry KXTU as part of the compensation for carrying KXRM. On August 30, 2010, KXTU-LP flash-cut from analog to digital on channel 57. On October 27, 2010, it changed its

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...

to KXTU-LD. In early 2012, the station moved from channel 57 to channel 20 and rebranded from CW 57 to SOCO CW. On February 28, 2013,

Barrington Broadcasting Barrington Broadcasting Group, LLC, headquartered in Schaumburg, Illinois was an American corporation focused on broadcast television, primarily in middle and small size media markets. Barrington owned or operated via duopoly twenty-four televi ...

announced the sale of its entire group, including KXTU-LD, to

Sinclair Broadcast Group Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (SBG) is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb of Cockeysville, Maryland, t ...

. The sale was completed on November 25. On August 20, 2014, Sinclair announced that it would sell KXRM-TV and KXTU-LD, along with WTTA in Tampa Bay and WHTM in

Harrisburg Harrisburg is the capital city of the Pennsylvania, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, Dauphin County. With a population of 50,135 as of the 2021 census, Harrisburg is the List of c ...

, to Media General in a swap for WJAR in

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay ...

WLUK-TV WLUK-TV (channel 11) is a television station in Green Bay, Wisconsin, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside Suring-licensed CW affiliate WCWF (channel 14). Both stations share studi ...

and WCWF in

Green Bay, Wisconsin Green Bay is a city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. The county seat of Brown County, it is at the head of Green Bay (known locally as "the bay of Green Bay"), a sub-basin of Lake Michigan, at the mouth of the Fox River. It is above sea lev ...

, and

WTGS WTGS (channel 28) is a television station licensed to Hardeeville, South Carolina, United States, serving as the Fox affiliate for the Savannah, Georgia, area. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, WTGS maintains transmitter facilities on Fort Argy ...

Savannah, Georgia Savannah ( ) is the oldest city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia and is the county seat of Chatham County, Georgia, Chatham County. Established in 1733 on the Savannah River, the city of Savannah became the Kingdom of Great Br ...

. The swap is part of Media General's merger with LIN Media. WHTM's sale of Media General was explored nearly two months earlier, and it was completed, nearly three months before the Media General/LIN deal was completed. The sale was completed on December 19.Sinclair Broadcast Group Closes on Certain Station Acquisitions and Divestitures with Media General
, Press Release,

, Retrieved 19 December 2014 A condition of the sale maintained the station's affiliation with Sinclair's American Sports Network package of college sports.

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed: The station carried programming from MundoFox/ MundoMax on its second subchannel throughout its three-year existence from August 2013 until December 2016. The station launched Antenna TV in June 2020.

News programming

Unlike its sister station, KXTU does not air newscasts, but during a breaking news event or weather bump, it simulcasts KXRM's coverage.

References

External links

SOCO CW
* {{Major U.S. TV O-O Stations XTU-LD The CW affiliates Bounce TV affiliates Laff (TV network) affiliates Antenna TV affiliates Low-power television stations in the United States Nexstar Media Group Television channels and stations established in 1999 1999 establishments in Colorado