VHF Early development Regional tv stations in the United States were focused on the VHF dial (channels 213) in the early days of the industry. However, it soon emerged that the twelve channels offered on the VHF dial would not be adequate to satisfy the needs of the growing industry.
As a reward for business to run UHF stations, the FCC relaxed the ownership limit for a provided entity from 5 to seven stations, offered that no greater than 5 were on the VHF dial. With this opportunity to broaden its roster of O&O s, NBC bought WBUF-TV (channel 17) in Buffalo in 1955 and WKNB-TV (channel 30) in New Britain, Connecticut (near Hartford) in 1957, and altered WKNB's call letters to WNBC-TV (the contemporary WNBC in New York City utilized the WRCA-TV callsign from 1954 to 1960).
Nevertheless, WBUF consistently ranked behind its VHF competitors, WGR-TV (channel 2, now WGRZ) and WBEN-TV (channel 4, now WIVB-TV). Similarly, WNBC consistently ranked behind VHF rival WNHC-TV (channel 8, now WTNH); WNBC faced an additional problem as its signal was not strong enough to cover New Haven and western Connecticut (almost all of Connecticut is part of the Hartford-New Sanctuary market).
While it discovered a buyer for WNBC (which retained its NBC association), there were no takers for WBUF, and it went off the air in 1958. NBC then associated with WGR-TV, where it remains to this day. This Is Noteworthy donated WBUF's license and a few of its devices to PBS WNED-TV, which took over the channel 17 frequency in 1959 (due to a number of transactions, the WBUF-TV license is now held by WNLO and the channel 17 frequency was later on held by WBXZ-LD; WNED still holds the virtual channel 17 in the Buffalo market, however has not advertised it given that the early 2000s).
Nevertheless, CBS' ratings were astonishingly low in those markets. In 1959, CBS decided to move its Hartford and Milwaukee associations to VHF stations WTIC-TV and WITI-TV (channel 6) respectively, and sold what ended up being WHCT (now Univision affiliate WUVN) and WXIX (now CW affiliate WVTV) ironically, CBS was sent back to the UHF dial in Milwaukee following an affiliation switch in December 1994, which saw WITI ending up being a Fox station, while its former CBS association moved to WDJT-TV (channel 58).