Wikipedia
WGTV channel 8 is the metro Atlanta station and flagship for Georgia Public Broadcasting (formerly Georgia Public Television), Georgia's Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) state network.
The station transmits from the top of Stone Mountain in state-owned Stone Mountain Park, located just east of Atlanta in Stone Mountain, Georgia. (It shares this short broadcast tower with NOAA Weather Radio station KEC80, and formerly with WABE FM 90.1.) The city of license is Athens, Georgia, a legacy of its early years as a service of the University of Georgia. It is considered the primary ("parent") station for one (originally two) low power television (LPTV) broadcast translator, in the north Georgia mountains. Eight other full-power stations also simulcast the network across the state, originally relayed via microwave radio towers and now via communications satellite. There is no local insertion, instead all station identification is done on a single screen for all stations.
WGTV's analog signal was the strongest of the GPB TV network, covering most of the northern part of Georgia, extending in about a 75-mile (120 km) radius from the transmitter site. WGTV's digital/ HDTV facility started broadcasting on December 20, 2007 on channel 12. However, it was at very low power, unable to be received through much (if not most) of metro Atlanta. It moved from channel 12 to full power on channel 8 after the analog shutdown in February 2009, using the same digital transmitter re-tuned to use the channel 8 antenna. This selection, made without conflict in the first-round digital channel election, is due to WDEF-TV in Chattanooga opting to stay digital on channel 12. WGTV was originally assigned channel 22 for DTV operations, but requested the frequency allotment change to channel 12 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), also allowing a change to 22 (from 59) by WSKC-CD. "Distant" viewers can receive two other GPB digital TV stations: WNGH-TV 33 (18.x) in the northwest metro area, and WJSP-TV 23 (28.x) in the southwest.
The analog station was 316 kilowatts effective radiated power (ERP) (the maximum for high VHF), at HAAT. The temporary digital station was only 16 kW at . The current 21 kW is still well below the limit of 63 kW for digital stations on high VHF (channels 7 to 13), which would also be legally equivalent to what it had on analog. Because of this, reception is still difficult in much of metro Atlanta. Unfortunately for over-the-air PBS viewers, the same situation also exists at WPBA, though WGTV is still available on most analog cable TV systems unlike WPBA, which was cut off by Comcast.