[agentsquash]

Presumably the macro-regional arrangement is only a short-term interim arrangement, with full regionalisation to follow ASAP afterwards.

Much as was the case in the 2000s with the limited number of English Regions initially made available via the red button on digital satellite BBC One, when LDN replaced UK Today as the default output. Full regionalisation followed fairly soon afterwards.

My guesses for the macro-regional services were based on which are the most densely-populated of the buddied-up regions, rather than current HD studio capability.

The North becomes a bit of a problem in that case.

All the rest have at least some common overlap - but there isn’t that much shared across the Pennines (apart from perhaps some stories about Northern/TPE being a continual mess).

For viewers in north Cumbria, NWT would be a better choice than directing them to stories in Leeds/York. Likewise, for viewers in the NE, there’s no point showing what’s going on in Liverpool. The populations are roughly similar, too, so the inability to do an east/west split isn’t the best.

The least worst solution would probably be to air Look North (from Leeds) on HD, even if NWT is the HD studio - purely because ITV air Granada across the whole region. But I guess it’s only temporary!