Based in | Leeds, West Yorkshire |
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Broadcast area | Most of Yorkshire from 1968, Lincolnshire from 1974, Nottinghamshire (part), Derbyshire (part), Norfolk (part), Lancashire (part) |
First airdate | 29 July 1968 |
Replaced | Granada Television (Monday morning to Friday evening) and ABC Weekend Television (Saturday morning to Sunday evening) |
Owned by | ITV plc |
Website | ITV Yorkshire |
Former logo | |
Former Yorkshire Television logos. |
ITV Yorkshire is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV network. Until 1974, this was primarily the historic county of Yorkshire and parts of neighbouring counties served by the Emley Moor and Bilsdale transmitting station transmitters. Following a re-organisation in 1974 the transmission area was extended to include Lincolnshire, northwestern Norfolk and parts of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, served by the Belmont transmitter, but lost the far north of Yorkshire served by the Bilsdale transmitter which covered Tyne Tees Television.
Two consortia applied for the franchise, Telefusion Yorkshire Ltd and Yorkshire Independent Television, the former having large financial backing (supported by the Blackpool-based Telefusion television rental chain) and the latter having the better plans but fewer resources.
On 1 January 2007, the company transferred its programme production business to ITV Studios Limited. As a consequence, Yorkshire Television Limited ceased to trade on 1 January 2007. Yorkshire Television Ltd still legally exists, but its licence is now owned and operated by ITV plc under the licence name of ITV Broadcasting Limited (along with all the other ITV plc-owned franchises). Yorkshire Television Ltd is, along with most other regional companies owned by ITV plc, listed on www.companieshouse.gov.uk as a "Dormant company".
ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television, and sometimes abbreviated to YTV or Yorkshire, has its origins in the 1967 franchise round. That round stipulated that the influential pan-North region, the licence which was owned by Granada Television and ABC, both based in Manchester, had to be split up. Consequently, it was decided that Granada would keep the North West franchise and a new franchise created for Yorkshire. On 28 February 1967, national and regional newspapers carried numerous advertisements from the Independent Television Authority, each requesting applicants for various new ITV contracts, one of which was Programme Contractor for Yorkshire Area (Contract D) – All Week. Ten formal bids were received by the closing date; another less-serious bid, Diddy TV, headed by comedian Ken Dodd withdrew their application.