Television Sydney - Broadcast Programs

Broadcast Programs

TVS broadcasts twenty-four hours a day seven days a week. Despite a very limited marketing budget the channel is progressively creating a loyal audience. TVS recorded continual increases in cumulative audience numbers during the first few years. However, as digital take-up in Sydney increased the channel reported a leveling off of audience growth during 2009. When it launched its digital service in early 2010 audience levels began to increase again with a 15 percent increase in the first month (source OzTAM).

TVS uses the same Broadcast Australia tower as the ABC and SBS located at Gore Hill. The channel provides coverage across most of Sydney, with reports of clear reception from locations as far south as Wollongong, in the lower Blue Mountains and on the Central Coast. Its Digital 44 service has coverage that is equivalent to SBS (and the other free-to-airs), except that TVS does not have a number of in-fill repeaters that boost signals in some "black spots".

TVS has a broadcast operations centre on the UWS Penrith campus. The station's digital automation system is based on the Playbox software.

The focus is on Sydney-specific programming with some programs sourced from interstate community channels and from professional program makers. As at February 2010 more than forty percent of the channel's programs were Sydney produced with a further thirty percent drawn from interstate community based producers.

The station screens feature films in the public domain on weekday mornings and in prime time on Sunday and Wednesday evenings. On Friday nights TVS screens horror and science fiction films on the Schlocky Horror Picture Show hosted by a skeleton named Nigel Honeybone.

Not-for-profit community based producers receive free program airtime. TVS has announced the creation of the Television Sydney Foundation whose aim is to secure philanthropic donations that will be used to support the development of local programming.

The TVS program schedule is based on a "modified wheel" concept where programs are run several times in the same week to allow audiences a choice of viewing times. The station's program line-up is published on its website, in most Australian electronic program guides (EPG's) and in the Sydney Morning Herald and Daily Telegraph newspapers.

TVS accepts sponsorship advertising, limited to seven minutes per hour. It also sells program airtime (a maximum of eight hours per day as permitted under its licence conditions).