While communities can at any time consider rebroadcasting or cablecasting as a means to improve their local communications infrastructures (access to more radio, TV, Internet, and phone services), the digital transition presents several unique opportunities (click to find out more):

1. Community distribution is less expensive than the alternatives, if you lose service after the digital transition.
2. The new digital transmitters enable more cost-effective rebroadcasting (multiplexing) of channels than ever before.
3. You can get highspeed Internet too.
4. Local broadcasters may be able to help.

Go back to main Costs page.

Some of the setup costs and equipment of cablecasting are similar to those for rebroadcasting:

• engineering consultancy to help plan your cable network and where to locate a satellite dish to receive remote signals from satellite.

  Budget $1500-$10,000.

• one or more satellite dishes and receivers to receive the remote signals. They are usually mounted on the roof of the "cable head-end" facility. The head end can be as small as a closet, located in any community or municipal building. You need one dish and receiver per satellite; for example, some channels may be available on a satellite belonging to Bell, and others may be available from Shaw.

Budget $2-500


• cable converter boxes (one per channel) stored in the cable head end to convert the satellite signal into cable channels that TVs in your community can interpret. Budget $500 per remote channel that you want to bring to the community.
• cable from the head end to all the houses in the neighbourhood. This cable is usually laid in trenches in public rights of way alongside streets, like underground phone and hydro lines, so you'll need the co-operation of the municipality. (Municipality involvement helps if you're rebroadcasting too, but it's essential for cablecasting.)

  If the phone and hydro lines in your community run from pole to pole in the air, the situation is more complex, because you'll have to obtain permission from the phone or hydro supplier: whoever owns the poles.

The following are low-end cost estimates to set up a community rebroadcasting scheme:

• engineering consultancy to determine the best place in your community from which to transmit signals (usually a high place with an unobstructed view of the whole community). You will also need the engineer(s) to help you purchase, install and test your equipment.

  Budget $1500-15,000. (At the low end, many communities have obtained help from local engineers for free, covering only their expenses.)

• the transmission site, from which to rebroadcast the services. This could be an existing building, an existing tower belonging to another party to which the community obtains access, or a new tower that the community or municipality builds on land that it owns, leases, or acquires.

  Budget:

  • $0 on an existing building
  • $0-200/month for space on the tower of a sympathetic local broadcaster (see BUT HOW DO WE PAY FOR IT?)
  • $200-300/month to lease space commercially on a tower belonging to another television or radio broadcaster, cell phone company, dispatch service, oil or gas company
  • from a low of about $70,000 up to a couple of hundred thousand to build your own, but this should rarely be necessary; most municipalities have access to or own towers that serve other purposes.
  • one satellite dish and receiver for each satellite company from whom you want to acquire remote signals at the transmission site.

  Budget $2-500.
  

  • a digital transmitter and antenna to rebroadcast these signals to your community.
    

If you will be offering a local community TV and/or radio service, CACTUS* can help you find an appropriate location, design the facility, and mobilize the community to use it. Here are a few considerations to get you started:

Choosing a Location

There are three main factors to consider when choosing a location for a production facility:

1. Proximity to the Transmitter or Head End

   To play back programs that the community produces, the production facility either needs to be located in the same place as the transmitter or cable head end, or there must be either a line-of-sight microwave link or a cable connection.

2. Convenience and Visibility

   It's important that your production facility is easy to access. For example, can you get to it using public transportation? Is there plenty of free parking? Will people pass it on a daily basis?

   You want a location in the heart of your community.

3. Collocation with Other Community Resources

   To keep costs down and to leverage synergies with existing community resources, it often makes sense to situate the community production facility inside or close to related resources. For example:

   In a highschool. The highschool language arts curriculum in most provinces requires a module in media literacy. Many schools already have media production facilities in-house, but lack distribution.

   In a library. Many libraries already offer Internet access (some are "CAP" sites; see the link below for more information) and have a mandate to promote community communications.

The sixth step to implement a community distribution scheme is to negotiate for the remote channels you want. In reality, you'll likely be doing this at the same time as you're building the infrastructure (step 5), or even earlier, when you decide whether you need a distribution licence.

TV

If you are implementing a rebroadcasting (over-the-air) scheme, there are no limitations on what channels you can offer. You might just want the CBC, or just APTN (the Aborignal People's Television Network), or just 2 or 3 or a half dozen services residents consider vital.

If you are implementing a cablecasting service on the other hand, the CRTC requires that you offer a minimum number of core Canadian services, whether or not you require a distribution licence.

Generally speaking, channels that are available free over-the-air in other parts of Canada are free; for example, the CBC, CTV and Global. "Specialty services" that are available only on cable or satellite (like the History Channel, the ichannel, or the Discovery Channel) have to be paid for at a set fee per household.

Radio

There are no per-household fees to obtain radio channels that are free to air in other parts of Canada.

Satellite Uplink/Downlink

As a community, you will have to pay a downlink fee to the satellite company for supplying you with the TV and radio signals.

If you are offering a wireless or cable Internet service, you will need to pay both up uplink and downlink fees, so that residents can both send and receive information across the Internet.

For an idea how much these costs might be, see Costs.

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