STV Glasgow to begin broadcasting today

A NEW television channel dedicated to Glasgow begins broadcasting tonight.

The new STV Glasgow team. Picture: STV

STV Glasgow will begin broadcasting at 6.30pm to viewers in the west of Scotland on Freeview channel 23, Sky channel 117 and Virgin channel 159.

The station is being promoted as a mix of news and features, live and interactive programmes, original shows and re-runs of popular series including Take the High Road and Taggart.

The first programme scheduled to air is The Riverside Show, a two-hour magazine programme filling the early evening slot.

Tonight it will feature live broadcasts from the West End Festival, a performance from Glasgow band The Shiverin’ Sheiks and a feature about the Glaswegian said to have introduced football to Brazil.

Other programmes include Peter and Roughie’s Football Show, My Life in Ten Pictures and The Blether.

Polish drama Czas Honoru (Days of Honour) will air from Wednesday with subtitles.

Channel editor Paul Hughes said: “STV Glasgow will provide a unique platform for a diverse range of programming including our daily, live and interactive magazine show. The brand new channel will go live tonight with a mixture of new, original formats and popular archive programmes.

“A city TV channel dedicated to Glasgow gives us the ability to deliver content that is locally relevant and we look forward to bringing viewers an engaging mix of news, innovative formants and classic gems from the STV archive.”

Ofcom awarded local licences to STV for Glasgow and Edinburgh in January 2013. STV Edinburgh will be launched later in the year.

The new channels will also be available to watch live online via the STV Player.

Elizabeth Partyka, deputy director of channels at STV, said: “STV is Scotland’s leading media brand and through our channel 3 licences we have unrivalled consumer reach.

“City TV is a welcome addition to our portfolio of services and we believe we are in a strong position to deliver this new service for Scotland’s largest city, and for the capital when we launch STV Edinburgh later this year. Both these cities have a unique identity and this will be reflected in their new city TV channels.”