KPIX-TV

KPIX-TV, channel 5, is a CBS owned-and-operated television station located in San Francisco, California, USA. The station is owned by the CBS Television Stations subsidiary of CBS Corporation, and is part of a duopoly with CW owned-and-operated station KBCW (channel 44).

The station's studios are located just north of San Francisco's Financial District, and its transmitter is located on Sutro Tower. In addition to KBCW, KPIX shares its studios with its CBS Radio partners: KCBS, KFRC-FM, KITS, KLLC, KMVQ-FM and KZDG, although they use a different address number for Battery Street (865 as opposed to 855).

In the few areas of the western United States where a CBS station is not receivable over-the-air, KPIX is available to Dish Network customers as part of All American Direct's distant network package.

History

KPIX-TV signed on the air on December 22, 1948 as the first television station in northern California, as well as the 49th in the United States. It was originally owned by Associated Broadcasters, owners of KSFO (560 AM). Initially, channel 5's signal was transmitted from a tower on top of the Mark Hopkins Hotel on Nob Hill. It later moved to a shared transmitter tower with KGO-TV at the Sutro Mansion (which was located midway between Mount Sutro and Twin Peaks), and then to the Sutro Tower in 1973. KPIX's first studio was in the attic of the Mark Hopkins Hotel (just above the "Top of the Mark").