The BBC has announced that its sole HD channel - BBC HD - will now run for nine hours daily.
Danielle Nagler, head of BBC HDTV, revealed the programming expansion and states that the channel will begin at 4pm daily and run through to between 12.30am and 1.30am.
Looking ahead, she states that the nine-hour run is the maximum permitted by the BBC Trust, and a newly-implemented scheduling team will now shift focus onto programming and consistency.
Though no new HD programmes have yet been announced, Nagler adds that hit U.S. series The Wire won't be showing in HD due to it being filmed on digibeta. Hoping to find a better mix of HD content, she reveals that the Chelsea Flower Show will not feature in HD this year, and that Six Nations rugby is a focal point for 2010.
The channel, available to Freesat, Virgin Media and Sky subscribers, clearly still has some way to go, and the BBC will be kicking off an ad campaign beginning in April - followed by the launch of HD programming on its hugely-popular iPlayer service.
