A new television station for Oxford is about to start operating after a U-turn by planners.

And the Oxford Channel's joint managing director Thomas Harding promised one of the first news investigations he did would be into the worries of the people who opposed him.

The service, which will go out all over Oxfordshire on Channel 6, has to beam from the Beckley mast.

Local residents were worried about developments round the mast, including the new service, and put a halt on it last month when they objected to South Oxfordshire District Council northern area planning committee. The Oxford Channel re-submitted its application specifically. Mr Harding told the committee that no other mast would do but Beckley.

He said about 500,000 people in the county would get the free non-digital service directly into their homes just by tuning to Channel 6 and everything was set for it to start operating on June 6.

"Without the equipment on the mast we cannot operate. This is a make or break situation," he said.

The service concentrating on Oxfordshire affairs would be seen in Abingdon, Kidlington, Wallingford, Wantage, Cumnor, Watlington, Stadhampton, Didcot, Wheatley, Brill and Oakley, as well as Oxford. After the decision to allow the development at Beckley to take place, he said: "It is great news.

"I understand why the residents are worried and one of the first news features we will do will be to investigate the worries they have and what can be done about them."

Story date: Saturday 24 April

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.