BBC London entirely, while a new programme, "South East Today" was to be created for the new South East region. BBC London, as it came to be called, replaced the long-running "Newsroom South East". Greater London and its environs have had a regional BBC television news service for many decades, but the boundaries of the region have always been somewhat nebulous due to the coverage areas of the transmitters used, as television signals do not tend to stick neatly to administrative or historical boundaries. Therefore, while the main focus of "regional" news coverage for this area has always been on the capital
BBC television drama oversaw the rise of more populist continuing drama series, however, encouraged by the ratings-chasing strategy of the then Controller of BBC1, his friend Michael Grade. It was during Powell's tenure that the BBC launched the twice-weekly soap opera "EastEnders" (1985–present) and the medical drama "Casualty" (1986–present), both of which remain linchpins of the BBC One schedule today and the highest-rated drama productions on BBC television. Indeed, "EastEnders" achieved phenomenal success in its early years, its Christmas Day 1986 episode earning a massive 30.15 million viewers, the highest British television audience of the 1980s.Aside from these continuing dramas, based in one