News 14 Carolina - History

History

News 14 Carolina was not the first local 24-hour television news channel in the Raleigh area. WRAL-TV started a news channel on the Time Warner Cable digital tier in July 2001.

Time Warner planned to debut the 24-hour local news channel in December 2001 in Raleigh, Durham, Fayetteville, and Goldsboro, reaching 425,000 subscribers. After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Alan Mason, the channel's general manager, said the debut would happen in February or March 2002. This was because the station's employees needed training that would have taken place at new studios for NY1 in New York City, but NY1 was concentrating on coverage of the attacks and had not yet moved into its new studios. News 14 Carolina finally made its debut March 22, 2002. Reporters used digital cameras instead of videotape, downloading their stories. Sets, however, looked similar to those at conventional TV stations.

Plans were made to add Charlotte and eight surrounding counties in June. A two-story addition to the Time Warner building on East Morehead Street housed "the nation's most technically advanced newsroom," with digital video that reporters could edit at their desks, and robot cameras. In addition, Gastonia and Salisbury had bureaus. After nine months of preparation, the Charlotte operation began June 14, with Jim Newman as news director.

Jack Stanley, president of Time Warner's Greensboro division, said that if the Charlotte and Raleigh operations did well, a Greensboro news channel was likely. This was true even though WXLV-TV had recently shut down its low-rated news operation after failing to compete with the three established stations.

After two years on the air, the Charlotte operation's web site won an Edward R. Murrow award for best web site among large-market TV stations.

In 2004, Belo Corp. ended its partnership, forcing the Charlotte operation to cut costs by moving administrative, production and master control jobs to Raleigh and closing the Salisbury and Gastonia bureaus, resulting in the loss of about 50 jobs.

From 2005 to 2008, News 14 was the cable home of the Charlotte Bobcats. Comporium, the main cable provider for the South Carolina side of the Charlotte area, simulcast News 14's Bobcats broadcasts on Tri-County 14.

News 14 Carolina begain producing newscasts for WXLV-TV in the Piedmont Triad on January 2, 2012. The newscasts, branded simply as News 14 Carolina on ABC 45, air at 6:30 a.m., 6 p.m., and 11 p.m. on weekdays, and required an expansion in News 14's staff. The deal between News 14 and WXLV was reached following the resolution of a retransmission consent dispute between Time Warner Cable and Sinclair Broadcast Group (WXLV's parent company) on February 2, 2011.