Local affiliates not showing Widescreen programming?

[Justin Bauer]

I encountered this several times over the past few years.

I live in Austin, TX, but I am originally from Houston. Whenever I go back to Houston to visit my family and friends, I notice that the NBC affiliate there "zooms" the widescreen presentation of ER on NBC to be fullscreen. It is to the point where the the names from the opening credits are all cut off and you cannot even tell what they really say.

I thought this possibly could have only been because the particular episode that aired was a re-run.

But, during a the season finale, I called a friend and she confirmed that her ER was shown in fullscreen while mine in Austin was in widescreen.

I have never seen anything like this before. Does anyone else have an affiliate that does this?

 

[Kenneth Cummings]

Channel 4 in Indianapolis would show Angel in fullscreen following the episode that introduce Connor in the fifth season. It continue until the very end of the show (including the last episode).

 

[Kevin Porter]

I can confirm that the Houston affiliate does this with not only ER but The West Wing. I noticed this one night when a weather bug appeared and pushed the show to the upper right corner of the screen and it suddenly went to widescreen. It came back full size and for a second it was widescreen then it was zoomed back. Houston has only done this just this past year and with a Sorkinless West Wing, who really cares?

 

[Ike]

The affiliate in Dallas does this. Ironically, it chops the NBC logo in half.