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'ITV Central' (formerly 'Central Independent Television' and commonly known as just 'Central') is the British Independent Television contractor for the Midlands^[1], succeeding ATV on 1 January 1982. The main news programme for the region is ''Central Tonight''.

Contents

History

Launch

Studio facilities

Sub-regions

Ownership

Programme production

References

External links

History

During the 1970s, previous Midlands licence holder, ATV had often been criticised for its lack of regionality to its area. ATV still housed its main studios at Elstree, London, a legacy of when the company also served London at the weekends prior to 1968.
ATV attempted to address its problem in 1980 as part of its franchise re-application, with plans for a second major facility in the area (to be based in Nottingham) and as part of the IBA plan for the contract to be a dual region, they would provide separate news coverage for both the East and the West Midlands. Also the company would be changed from ATV Network Limited to ATV Midlands Limited, thus reinforcing its new regional focus. The Independent Broadcasting Authority accepted the belief that ATV Midlands Ltd planned to take a more local identity, and awarded the contract to ATV Midlands Limited on the basis that further changes were to be implemented, including Associated Communications Corporation would divest 49% of its shareholding in the company in attempt to introduce local shareholders and that its registered office should be within the region. It was also compulsory for ATV to change its company name. ^[2]
It has been reported that, around the time of the franchise changing hands, a canny local businessman registered dozens of company names (some of which included the words "Central" and "Television"), in the hope of being offered substantial financial compensation to relinquish the rights to one of these, if chosen by the new company. Central got around this by simply inserting "Independent" into their name on registering it (something the businessman had not thought of)[1].

Launch

Central retained ATV' sub-regional split; one sub-region for the West Midlands (with studios in Birmingham), and one for the East Midlands (with studios in Nottingham)^[3]. There were few differences between the subregions, but each has its own news service and advertisements. This led to the BBC also producing two news programmes (''Midlands Today'' for the West and ''East Midlands Today'' for the East). Central pre-empted the 1990 Broadcasting Act (and a new condition of the Midlands licence) by adding a third sub-region - Central South - in 1989, broadcasting on the Oxford transmitter and establishing the news centre on an industrial park in Abingdon in Oxfordshire (retained for the Thames Valley service in 2006, although minus the studio).
Although a new identity to viewers, Central enjoyed the benefit of effectively being a long-established ITV company. For a short while, some shows made by ATV prior to the changeover were transmitted with a static Central caption leading into an animated ATV ident, thus creating confusion to viewers and undermining any attempt by Central to impress its own identity. The much-vaunted share issue had a poor reception (the country was in recession at the time) and resulted in a large minor shareholding being obtained by businessman Robert Maxwell.

Studio facilities

Initially, Central inherited ATV's 1970's Broad Street studios, ''ATV Centre'', which was re-named ''Central House'' upon change of name. It was retained as Central's main base of activity until 1996. Upon winning the franchise, Central decided to construct new studios for its East sub-region, based in Nottingham, Lenton Lane. Until the new Nottingham studios were ready, Central operated from a converted facility on an industrial estate at Giltbrook, near Eastwood on the outskirts of Nottingham. Operations at Nottingham were to be staffed by employees originally based at Elstree, which led to may problems due to the relocation, including industrial action (in fact, it was because of this industrial action that the promised separate news service for the East Midlands didn't begin until 1984, by which time they had vacated Giltbrook [2]).
In 1989, Central opened a third studios for its new South sub-region, based in Abingdon, near Oxford.

In 1994, Carlton acquired land on Gas Street, Birmingham, to begin work on building a new digital studio complex, with the intention of replacing Central's Broad Street studios. The new centre was completed in 1997, when Central West's regional news department moved from its Broad Street base. A tribute programme to Broad Street was broadcast on Central News.^[4]
Having been one of the first fully computerised news programmes, Central News South was again a pioneer of new technology when, in the Spring of 2001, state-of-the-art Quantel digital video servers and edit suites were installed, along with a complete re-fit of camera and VTR equipment, plac Central South was the forefront of digital news-gathering in regional news.
In February 2004, ITV plc announced plans to close and sell the Nottingham Lenton Lane production centre, located in Nottingham. Following the closure of the Lenton Lane studios, a new news-gathering centre was established in the city, but production of Central News East moved to Central's Birmingham Gas Street studio in Spring 2005. The former studio complex is now part of The University of Nottingham and is known as 'King's Meadow Campus'^[5]. It still maintains one Studio (Studio 7), and this is rented out to television and film Companies, generating income for the University.
In October 2004, ITV plc closed Central's presentation/transmission department, moving transmission to the Northern Transmission Centre in Leeds. Although there was heavy opposition, the role of presentation and transmission at Birmingham had been significantly reduced after Network presentation was centralised to LNN in London in 2002 and so there was an inevitability that this function would be moved out. CITV (Children's ITV), which had been presented from Central's Birmingham studios since 1983, was also re-homed to Granada's studios in Manchester, with all content pre-recorded and with out-of vision presentation.
It was announced on 6 June 2006 that Central News South's existence as a news region was to end after 17 years when it would merge its operations with Meridian West's output, forming a new news region named ITV Thames Valley and a new news programme, Thames Valley Tonight. Originally, the changes were supposed to make over 40 workers redundant from the closure of Central South's Abingdon base, however this was later reduced to 20 ^[6]. The last edition was broadcast on Sunday 3rd December, although there was a pan-regional Central News broadcast the following morning during GMTV. At the same time, ITV West's broadcast footprint was expanded to cover Cheltenham and Gloucestershire from the West's Bristol studios, while Herefordshire re-joined Central News West from Birmingham. Abingdon was retained as a newsgathering base, whilst equipment was sold off.

Sub-regions

Central currently operates two subregions with shared involvement in a third:

★ 'Central West' - based in Birmingham Gas Street predominately operating from the Sutton Coldfield, The Wrekin and recently Ridge Hill transmitters and associated relays.

★ 'Central East' - with newsgathering centre in Nottingham but now based in Birmingham Gas Street, operating from the Waltham transmitter and associated relays.

★ 'ITV Thames Valley' - Now shared with Meridian. Previously two subregions; 'Central South' and 'Meridian North', merged in 2006. Central South's Abingdon base has been retained as a newsgathering centre and general office, however produced from Meridian's studios in Whiteley, Hampshire. Broadcast from the Oxford and Hannington transmitters plus associated relays.

Ownership

Carlton Communications had owned a stake in Central since the early eighties (before Carlton Television became an ITV Franchisee in its own right). In 1994, Central was completely bought by Carlton and on 6 September 1999 was rebranded as Carlton Central, though the registered company name remained Central Independent Television Limited. The new identity, produced by Lambie-Nairn was used across all of Carlton's franchises; Carlton London, Carlton Westcountry and HTV. Only the "Carlton" name was used on air, however Central's regional news programmes retained the "Central" brand.
With the merger of Carlton and Granada on 2 February 2004, the brand became ITV1 Central. Central Independent Television is currently owned by ITV plc.
On 29 December 2006, Central's registered company name was changed from ''Central Independent Television Ltd'' to ''ITV Central Ltd''.

Programme production

The company though performed strongly on programming carrying on several ATV shows, most notably the soap-opera ''Crossroads''. Original programming included the comedy-drama ''Auf Wiedersehen Pet'' (more recently revived by the BBC) and the game shows ''The Price Is Right'' & ''Blockbusters''. One of its most (in)famous quizzes was the darts-based game ''Bullseye'', originally hosted by comedian Jim Bowen and scored by darts commentator Tony Green. Due to the popularity of regular repeats on digital channel Challenge TV, the show has finally revived for Challenge by Granada Productions, although now recorded at The Leeds Studios (and sometimes The Manchester Studios) and presented by Dave Spikey instead of Jim Bowen.
Aside from continuing the theme of ATV, Central also produced the heavyweight drama ''Walter'' for the first evening of Channel 4. A critically-acclaimed drama it starred Ian McKellen in the eponymous lead role as a handicapped man adjusting to life after the death of his mother. The company also produced the detective drama ''Inspector Morse'' in association with Zenith Productions, a subsidiary of ''Carlton Communications'', which later purchased Central. Like ATV, Central was a large contributor to programmes for schools and colleges on the ITV network.
It scored a failure however with the 1986 comedy ''Hardwicke House'', about an anarchic comprehensive school. The first two episodes received so much public condemnation that the remainder were never aired.
Central's presentation improved and the branding and continuity became more refined, with the introduction of the ''Central cake'', a multi-coloured globe.
Whereas local news had been a constant criticism of ATV, Central invested more effort into it. As well as the east and west regions, in 1989 a third sub-region covering the South Midlands was created. With a news studio in Abingdon (near Oxford), Central News South was at the time of its creation the most automated news operation in the country. The service was launched on 9th January 1989, the opening night being fraught with technical problems. Presenters Wesley Smith and Anne Dawson co-presented the main programme, and were the longest-serving co-presenters of any ITV regional news programme, until Dawson's departure in 2003 to become a college lecturer. Anne was replaced as main presenter by Hannah Stewart-Jones, formerly of Channel TV. Both continue to appear on Thames Valley Tonight, although Wesley Smith's regular co-presenter is now Mary Green, formerly of the West opt-out of Meridian Tonight
The BBC finally responded to the creation of Central News South in 2000 by creating a sub-opt-out that is broadcast to Oxfordshire, eastern Wiltshire, and parts of Buckinghamshire.
As well as previously being at the heart of the ITV Network's children's and schools programming, Central was also a significant contributor to network sport production. Until it was moved to London (and merged with LNN's operations to form ITV Sport Productions), Central's sport department, under the leadership of Gary Newbon, produced nearly all of ITV's football coverage (from FA Cup to Champions' League).

References

1. Central Licence - Ofcom
2. ATV History - Independent TeleWeb
3. sub-TV - ATV History
4. Transdiffusion - A Trip to Broad Street
5. University of Nottingham - Kings Meadow Campus
6. MediaGuardian article (free subscription required)

External links

★ ITV Central at itvlocal.com

★ Interior and exterior photos of the original home of Central studios, Broad Street

★ Tiswas Online - Tiswas was a popular Saturday morning children's programme produced by ATV / Central.

★ Ident on Central branding