The Southern Ontario/WNY Radio-TV Forum / Rogers cancels CityLine after 40 years

**Posted by Capricasix** April 30, 2024 1:28 pm

David Rider of the Toronto Star just tweeted that CityLine has been cancelled. Tracy Moore, host since 2008, will be moving to BreakfastTelevision. There was a Star article, but it’s paywalled so I couldn’t read it.

**Posted by DeepTracks** April 30, 2024 2:10 pm

https://www.therecord.com/business/citytvs-cityline-cancelled-after-40-year-run-tracy-moore-moves-to-breakfast-television/article_5ad03bb0-bf49-548d-a033-aa11bac11e3d.html?li_source=base&li_medium=business

**Posted by Hansa** April 30, 2024 2:40 pm

Was Cityline City's last non-news local programme? City started out with a heavy "community programming" emphasis including some wacky experiments such as "Free For All". Now it's pretty much indistinguishable from any other "local" channel which, other than newscasts, runs only network and syndicated programming.

**Posted by Retrontario** April 30, 2024 3:52 pm

My fav original City show like that was called City Classified... and it was just Glen Cole sitting behind a desk literally reading classified ads out loud, with phone numbers and no area codes. I have a few episodes, will try and post some to the Retrontario YouTube channel soon. And farewell, CityLine!

**Posted by paterson1** April 30, 2024 11:54 pm

CityLine is showing highlights from the last 40 years with special guests. Marilyn Denis was on today I believe. She was one of the early hosts of the program from the City/CHUM days.

Even though it is supposed to be national, Breakfast Television still comes across as a Toronto/Southern Ontario morning show. Sid and crew are sometimes very funny.

**Posted by Shorty Wave** May 1, 2024 10:08 am

Too bad, even I watched CityLine from time to time! My favourite Citytv show, besides The NewMusic, (which I worked on), was Speakers Corner. Very low budget to produce and seriously a new show every week, even VHS’d it when I wasn’t going to be home……! Also enjoyed MediaTelevision.

**Posted by ED1** May 1, 2024 10:08 am

paterson1 wrote:
CityLine is showing highlights from the last 40 years with special guests. Marilyn Denis was on today I believe. She was one of the early hosts of the program from the City/CHUM days.

Even though it is supposed to be national, Breakfast Television still comes across as a Toronto/Southern Ontario morning show. Sid and crew are sometimes very funny.

Only the 8:30-10 AM portion of BT airs nationally. BT can be as Toronto as they wanna be before 8:30, but they still have that Toronto-centric factor present in the national portion.

Aside from that, BT could make for a very good national morning show for the entire timeslot, but doing so will a) probably alienate its Toronto viewers, b) would probably not do well against the well established local morning shows in other markets.

Last edited by ED1 (May 1, 2024 10:09 am)

**Posted by RadioActive** May 3, 2024 3:49 pm

Hansa wrote:
Was Cityline City's last non-news local programme? City started out with a heavy "community programming" emphasis including some wacky experiments such as "Free For All". Now it's pretty much indistinguishable from any other "local" channel which, other than newscasts, runs only network and syndicated programming.

Speaking of "Free For All," this is from Sept. 29, 1972 - just one day after the station went on the air. Sounds like an early version of "Speaker's Corner."

**Posted by Hansa** May 3, 2024 6:39 pm

Quite the spectacle.

Last edited by Hansa (May 3, 2024 6:43 pm)