Aboriginal Peoples Television Network - Distribution

Distribution

APTN's service consists of five different feeds: two terrestrial feeds, separate national cable feeds for Eastern (Manitoba and east) and Western Canada (Saskatchewan and west), as well as a national HD feed.

The terrestrial feed, the successor to the original TVNC, is available over-the-air in Canada's far northern areas. It consists of flagship station CHTY-TV in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, semi-satellite CHWT-TV in Whitehorse, Yukon and numerous low-powered rebroadcasters across the Northwest Territories, Yukon, Nunavut, Alberta, Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador.

On August 31, 2011, APTN shut down 39 low-power television repeaters across the Northwest Territories and Yukon, representing nearly half of its over-the-air transmitters. Although this happened to be on the same day as Canada's over-the-air digital conversion deadline in certain mandatory markets, these transmitters were not subject to this deadline as none of the mandatory markets were located the Northwest Territories and Yukon.

The Eastern Canada cable feed operated as the national feed until the Western Canada feed began service on October 2, 2006.

APTN is licensed as a national network by the CRTC, thus putting it on par with CBC Television, Radio-Canada and TVA. Since APTN's relaunch as a national network in 1999, all Canadian cable and satellite television providers have been required to include it in their basic service. However, many cable companies outside the Arctic place it above channel 60 on their systems, rendering it inaccessible to older cable-ready television sets that do not go above channel 60. The CRTC has considered requiring cable companies to move APTN to a lower dial position, but decided in 2005 that it would not do so.