Cable is under "must carry" rules. If a DMA city is close enough to the majority of the systems customers, those customers will receive those channels as significantly viewed. For example. I used to live in Central NJ. My cable company carried all network stations from New York City even though I was located in the Philadelphia DMA. It was sort of cool getting all those NFL games on Sunday. Always had 4 games. Giants, Jets Eagles and one other.This is NOT the case. There must be transponders in an area for cable to carry the signal.Cable doesn't "select" stations, they carry the DMA's station and they may carry another DMA's station if there is demand. Cable is not allowed to carry "distant" stations.Here's your guilty party in the "franchising" of DMAs.
Same deal for people in Southern CT. They get NYC and Hartford.
People in the Hudson Valley of New York get NYC and Albany NY stations. Again, these are CABLE customers