Emley Moor transmitting station

The Emley Moor transmitting station is a telecommunications and broadcasting facility on Emley Moor, west of the village centre of Emley, in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England. It is made up of a concrete tower and apparatus that began to transmit in 1971. It is protected under UK law as a Grade II listed building. It is the tallest freestanding structure in the United Kingdom, and 25th tallest tower in the world. It was the seventh tallest freestanding structure and was fourth tallest tower in the European Union before Brexit. When built it was the sixth tallest freestanding structure in the world after the Ostankino Tower, the Empire State Building, 875 North Michigan Avenue (known as The John Hancock Center), the Berliner Fernsehturm and Tokyo Tower. The tower's current official name, The Arqiva Tower, is shown on a sign beside the offices at the base of the tower, but it is commonly known just as "Emley Moor Mast". In 2021, the antenna was removed due to technical errors and it was replaced by a shorter antenna of but the structure still remains the tallest freestanding structure in the United Kingdom. Emley Moor has been a transmission site since the earliest days of commercial television in the UK. The present concrete tower is the third antenna support structure to have occupied the site. The first permanent transmitter built there was for ITV, covering much of the north of England. It had a lattice tower, which provided limited coverage. This original lattice tower was erected in 1956 to provide Independent Television broadcasts to the Yorkshire area. It entered service on 3 November 1956, transmitting Granada Television programmes on weekdays, and ABC TV programmes at weekends. In 1964, in anticipation of colour PAL transmissions set to begin in 1966, the original lattice tower was replaced by a taller guyed mast, identical to the structure at Belmont transmitting station in Lincolnshire, at (see map on mb21 - The Transmission Gallery). The dismantled lattice tower was rebuilt at Craigkelly transmitting station.