Mustard TV is to launch on Freeview next month – placing Norwich at the heart of a new era for local broadcasting.
The local station, which has been broadcasting online since January 2013, has announced that it will launch on Freeview channel 8 on March 24 at 5.30pm.
It will be the second local channel to go live in the UK, following the series of licences awarded by broadcast regulator Ofcom and is part of community media group Archant.
Mustard TV's managing director Fiona Ryder said the new channel will feature 'truly local' news from Norwich and Norfolk as well as a flagship magazine show.
'We want to redefine what people think of as local television,' she said. 'We hope to engage the community in ways that other stations that are broadcasting to a wider area, just can't.'
The station, which is owned by Eastern Daily Press and Norwich Evening News publisher Archant, will broadcast to up to 162,000 homes in Norwich and surrounding areas, from Cromer to Attleborough and from Dereham to Acle.
Miller Hogg, MD of Archant East said 'Mustard TV is owned, produced and managed in Norwich for the people of Norwich and I am proud that Archant who already publish the main newspaper and magazine media in Norwich since 1845 can now boast in 2014, some 169 years later, television as part of our latest media offering to our audience and our advertisers'
The new local channel will feature sport, politics and business content as well as hourly news bulletins, Monday to Friday, from 5.30pm to 10:30pm.
'The Mustard Show' – a flagship magazine programme promising a 'daily dollop of all things Norfolk' – will broadcast weekdays at 6.15pm, and will be co-hosted by former Norwich City star Darren Eadie.
Other programmes to be screened during the first week include the UK TV premiere of Splinter Bike, the documentary charting how two men from Norfolk set the first official world land-speed record on a bicycle built entirely from wood and Archive Half Hour a six-part series produced in association with Fragment Films and featuring film material from the East Anglian Film Archive.
On a visit to Norwich earlier this year, Prime Minister David Cameron offered his own words of support for Government-backed local television plans and Mustard TV.
Mr Cameron said: 'I think there's a huge hunger for really good local news, made by people who live in the area and who care about the area.
'I wish Mustard TV well. I think it's a great initiative.'
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