Metro Networks was a broadcasting outsourcing company based in

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

. It was a subsidiary of

Westwood One Westwood One, Inc. is an American radio network owned by Cumulus Media. The company syndicates talk, music, and sports programming. The company takes its name from an earlier network also named Westwood One, a company founded in 1976. The co ...

until its sale to

Clear Channel Communications iHeartMedia, Inc., or CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc., formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc., a company founded by ...

in 2011. The company operated local and regional news and traffic operations that provided regular reports to affiliates, together with its sister company Shadow Broadcast Services. At the time of the sale to Clear Channel Communications, Metro Networks had approximately 2,300 radio affiliates and 170 television affiliates operating in nearly every major radio and television market of the United States, as well as 700+ websites. In addition to offering live and recorded broadcasting reports, Metro Networks operated its own news wire service, Metro Source, rebranded by Clear Channel as ''24/7 News Source''. Metro Source was started in 1997 to compete with other wire services, such as the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American not-for-profit organization, not-for-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association, and produces news reports that are dist ...

and

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide writing in 16 languages. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency ...

. Its "World Desk" is based in Phoenix, Arizona. 24/7 News Source provides hundreds of radio stations and websites with national, state, feature and local stories, including audio and photos. On April 29, 2011, Westwood One sold Metro Networks to Clear Channel Communications for $119.25 million so it can concentrate on their other properties. Clear Channel combined Metro Networks with its own Total Traffic Networks. Metro Networks' traffic service was eventually folded into Total Traffic Networks later that year, with Clear Channel keeping the Total Traffic name for the operation.

References

External links

Official Website
of Metro Traffic (no longer owned by Metro Networks) {{Clear Channel Communications Companies based in Houston