diego california mexico united states city tijuana baja california branding cw 6 general cw 6 news news slogan helping you channels digital 23 uhf virtual 6 psip affiliations .1 the cw .2 canal 5 owner televisa radio televisi n s.a. de c.v. operator bay city television first air date april 29 1953 ; 63 years ago 1953 04 29 call letters meaning xe mexican itu prefix television sister station s xewt tdt xhuaa tdt former callsigns xetv tv 1953 2013 former channel number s analog 6 vhf 1953 2013 former affiliations primary independent 1953 1956 1973 1986 abc 1956 1973 fox 1986 2008 secondary nta 1956 1961 transmitter power 200 kw 1 height 215.0 meters 705.4 ft transmitter coordinates 32 30 7.9 n 117 2 26.8 w 32.502194 n 117.040778 w 32.502194 ; 117.040778 coordinates 32 30 7.9 n 117 2 26.8 w 32.502194 n 117.040778 w 32.502194 ; 117.040778 licensing authority ift website www.cw6sandiego.com xetv tdt virtual channel 6 uhf digital channel 23 is a television station located in tijuana baja california mexico whose over the air signal also covers the san diego california area across the international border in the united states . the station is owned by mexican media company grupo televisa ; its san diego based english language programming and sales rights are managed by bay city television a california based corporation owned by televisa . 2 3 xetv maintains production facilities on both sides of the border its american operations including the station s studio facilities news department and advertising sales offices are located on ronson road in the kearny mesa section of san diego while its technical operations and transmitter facilities are located on mount san antonio in tijuana . xetv broadcasts in english on its primary channel 6.1 under the brand cw 6 which serves as an affiliate of the cw . xetv s secondary digital subchannel 6.2 carries programming from the televisa owned network canal 5 ; 4 channel 6.1 is available on cable and satellite providers on the u.s. side of the market and is also available on directv to serve the few areas of the western united states where the cw s programming is not available through a local station . contents 1 history 1.1 early years 1.2 transition 1.3 as a fox affiliate 1.4 as a cw affiliate 2 special broadcast authority 3 digital television 3.1 digital channels 3.2 analog to digital conversion 3.3 repeaters 4 programming 5 news operation 5.1 notable former on air staff 6 radio 7 references 8 external links history edit early years edit xetv came into existence because of a technical quirk affecting stations in san diego and los angeles . even after the federal communications commission s sixth report and order lifted a four year long freeze on awarding television construction permits in 1952 signing on a third television station in the san diego market proved difficult . while san diego and los angeles are not close enough that one city s stations can be seen clearly over the air in the other the unique geography of southern california results in tropospheric propagation . this phenomenon makes co channel interference a significant enough problem that the two cities must share the vhf band . citation needed by 1952 san diego assigned channels 8 and 10 and los angeles assigned channels 2 4 5 7 9 11 and 13 already had all but three channels on the vhf band covered . channel 3 initially had been deemed unusable as a signal because keyt tv in santa barbara would travel in a straight line across the pacific ocean it would ultimately be allocated to tijuana once tv outlet xhtjb tv . san diego s first two television stations kfmb tv channel 8 and kfsd tv channel 10 now kgtv which were respectively affiliated with cbs and nbc were among the last construction permits issued before the fcc s freeze on new television station licenses went into effect . the uhf band introduced by the fcc after the freeze was not seen as a viable option ; television set makers were not required to include uhf tuners until 1964 as a result of the passage of the all channel receiver act . additionally several portions of san diego county are very mountainous and uhf signals do not carry very well across rugged terrain . citation needed complicating matters the mexican authorities had allocated two vhf channels to neighboring tijuana channels 6 and 12 . since these were the last two vhf channels left in the area the fcc did not accept any new construction permits from san diego as a courtesy to mexican authorities . one of the frequencies channel 6 had originally been assigned to san diego before the freeze ; it was reassigned to mexico as a result of the sixth report and order . 5 although san diego was large enough to support three television stations it soon became obvious that the only way to get a third vhf station on the air would be to use one of tijuana s allocations . the azc rraga family owners of telesistema mexicano the forerunner of televisa quickly snapped up the concession for channel 6 and signed xetv on the air on april 29 1953 . 6 it is the san diego area s second oldest television station citation needed after kfmb tv which began operations on may 16 1949 . at its launch xetv was an independent station broadcasting programs in both english and spanish from its studio facilities in tijuana . 7 8 channel 6 also established a business office and later a studio on park boulevard in the university heights section of san diego which handled sales accounts from north of the border . the azc rragas chose to focus xetv toward san diego and its english speaking audience because there were more households in that side of the market that had television sets at the time than there were in tijuana 9 which did not get its own all spanish station until 1960 when the azc rragas signed on sister station xewt tv channel 12 . 8 even though xetv is licensed to tijuana and owned by mexican interests for all intents and purposes it has been a san diego station from the beginning . owing to its initial bilingual bi national audience xetv billed itself as the international station during its early years . citation needed in april 1956 xetv received permission from the fcc to begin carrying programs from abc . 10 abc was carried part time by kfmb tv and kfsd tv at the time but the network immediately made xetv its exclusive san diego affiliate . around this time if not earlier the spanish language programs were dropped from the schedule and xetv would broadcast almost exclusively in english from that point since . however the fcc did not allow american networks to transmit their signals to stations located outside the united states . as a result abc programs were recorded on film kinescope and later videotape from a location north of the border and then physically transported to channel 6 s facilities in tijuana a practice known in the television industry as bicycling . while this arrangement legally circumvented the station s inability to acquire a direct network feed it left xetv unable to carry live network programming such as breaking news events and some sports coverage . the fcc held the option of renewing the authorization on an annual basis as well as reviewing it if and when a third commercial television station signed on in the american side of the market . citation needed transition edit in 1968 as it had every year since 1956 the fcc renewed its permit allowing abc to provide programming to xetv . only this time western telecasters which owned uhf independent station kcst tv channel 39 now knsd at the time contested it and began a lengthy battle to take san diego s abc affiliation from xetv . kcst claimed that it was no longer appropriate for a mexican licensed station to be affiliated with an american television network when there now was a viable american station available and also asserted that xetv had lacked local programming that effectively served the san diego audience . 11 12 13 in may 1972 the fcc siding with kcst revoked channel 6 s permission to carry abc programming with the wording of the commission s decision forcing abc to move its affiliation to kcst . 14 xetv and abc appealed to the u.s. court of appeals which eventually upheld the fcc ruling ; 15 the station later sought relief at the u.s. supreme court and was also denied . 16 xetv surrendered the abc affiliation to kcst in two stages daytime programming moved to kcst in june 1973 followed by primetime programs and all other shows including children s programming and sports by july 1 1973 . 17 in spite of seeing ratings gains both nationally and locally 18 abc was dissatisfied with having been forced onto a uhf station and stayed with kcst for only four years before moving to kgtv in 1977 . 19 20 xetv once again became an independent station with a standard program schedule composed of syndicated offerings off network programs movies and children s shows . in addition because mexican broadcast regulations did not limit commercial time citation needed as fcc regulations did at the time every sunday the station in a forerunner to future changes in the u.s. in effect became the first station in north america to carry an infomercial 21 which consisted of a one hour advertisement of listings of local houses for sale . as fcc regulations at that time limited television stations to 18 minutes of commercials in an hour such a program could not have been run on u.s. television at that time . 22 in 1976 xetv moved its business operations to an office facility on ronson road in the kearny mesa neighborhood of san diego ; the station s broadcast operations meanwhile remained in tijuana . channel 6 s tijuana based production and technical operations eventually moved from mexico into an expanded wing of this facility . 23 in the early 1980s xetv produced a popular comedy program disasterpiece theatre which parodied campy low budget horror and science fiction films by making fun of them as they aired similar to the format of mystery science theater 3000 a decade later . as a fox affiliate edit xetv s fourth and final fox era logo used from 2000 to july 2008 . in 1986 xetv became one of the very first stations outside of the original group of six television stations formerly owned by metromedia which had been purchased by fox s parent company affiliate news corporation earlier that year to sign deals to join the newly launched fox broadcasting company becoming a charter affiliate of the network when it launched on october 6 . similar to its earlier arrangement with abc channel 6 had to receive pre recorded fox programs on tape which were transported physically across the u.s. mexico border to the station s tijuana broadcast facilities . from 1993 to 1997 xetv also aired programming from the prime time entertainment network most notably babylon 5 on weekend afternoons instead of the weeknight primetime slots that were recommended by the programming service due to the fox programs that aired during the evening hours on the station . when fox acquired the broadcast rights to the nfl s national football conference in 1994 the fcc soon granted a waiver of the rules and allowed fox to transmit a direct network feed to xetv . in november 1995 mckinnon broadcasting owners of upn affiliate kusi tv channel 51 now an independent station filed an appeal in an unsuccessful attempt to wrestle the fox affiliation away from xetv . as cited in the u.s. court of appeals case channel