WLVT-TV
WLVT-TV is a PBS member television station in Allentown, Pennsylvania, United States. Owned by the Lehigh Valley Public Telecommunications Corporation, doing business as Lehigh Valley Public Media, it is a sister station to Philadelphia-licensed PBS member WPPT and WLVR-FM. WLVT-TV and WLVR-FM share studios at the Univest Public Media Center on the SteelStacks Campus on Sesame Street in the south side of Bethlehem; WLVT-TV's transmitter is located south of nearby Allentown atop South Mountain.
History
20th century
The station first signed on the air on September 7, 1965, as a member station of National Educational Television, and eventually joined PBS upon its 1970 founding. WLVT-TV is commonly known as "PBS39", a reference to the main virtual channel, 39.1.The Lehigh Valley is part of the Philadelphia market, the fourth-largest television market in the United States. Since the turn of the millennium, it has been picked up by many cable providers in the area, including Comcast, Service Electric, RCN, Blue Ridge Cable, and others. WLVT-TV is also available throughout the region on Philadelphia's DirecTV and Dish Network feeds. In recent years, it has expanded its reach to the entire Philadelphia market.
WLVT serves one of the largest potential audiences in the country with 6.7 million people in eastern Pennsylvania, western and southern New Jersey, and northern Delaware. With its recent focus on the broader market, channel 39 frequently competes with Philadelphia's main PBS member station, WHYY-TV, one of the most-watched PBS stations in the country. To a lesser extent, WLVT-TV also competes with NJ PBS's two outlets in the market, WNJT-TV and WNJS-TV.
21st century
In 2011, WLVT-TV moved from its longtime studio on Mountain Drive North to a new studio facility, the PPL Public Media Center, on the south side of Bethlehem. The new facility is adjacent to the ArtsQuest complex on the SteelStacks Campus, previously home to Bethlehem Steel. The new station is equipped with two large studios, where local productions, including Focus, You Bet Your Garden, Scholastic Scrimmage, Faces of Jazz, and Behind the Guitar, are filmed.WLVT also broadcasts PBS and American Public Television distributed programming.