Blue Ridge PBS is the community-licensed public television station for southwest Virginia, broadcasting WBRA-TV from Roanoke with six channels, the ECHO streaming service and PBS Appalachia Virginia, and reaching 42 percent of Virginia plus parts of three neighboring states.
Blue Ridge PBS is the public television station for southwestern, central and southside Virginia, licensed to Blue Ridge Public Television, Inc., a community nonprofit founded in 1967. WBRA-TV signed on August 1, 1967 as the first all-color educational station in the country and has been a PBS member since 1970. Its studios are at 1215 McNeil Drive SW in Roanoke, and its transmitter on Poor Mountain serves the Roanoke and Lynchburg market, with cable and streaming reach into bordering counties of Tennessee, West Virginia and North Carolina; the station describes its footprint as 42 percent of Virginia.
It broadcasts six channels: Blue Ridge PBS on 15.1, Blue Ridge ECHO TV, Blue Ridge PBS Kids, ECHO Lifestyles, ECHO Documentaries and Create. ECHO, launched in 2021, is a locally produced community and educational channel and streaming platform, and Blue Ridge Streaming carries the station online. In 2023 it launched PBS Appalachia Virginia, a cable and streaming PBS service for far Southwest Virginia that succeeded the former Southwest Virginia Public Television service and the satellite stations WSBN and WMSY. A local production team makes documentaries, shorts and series about regional issues, and the education team provides on-air and online learning for schoolchildren and teachers plus the ActiVAtED Learning and Fit Connection podcasts.
Blue Ridge PBS calls itself the region's storyteller. It hires in production, education, development, membership, marketing, engineering and administration, and applications for posted openings go by email to the station's jobs address.
