Charlotte's N.C. plan would alter billboard rules

July 15 2007

The Charlotte City Council will consider changes to the city's billboard rules after a public hearing Monday.
The proposed changes would allow electronic billboards to switch ads more frequently but would restrict their size, height and location.
Some council members are already riled up about the proposal. They are worried that the current ordinance hasn't been enforced, and that electronic billboards would create clutter and distractions.
"It's too much like Vegas," council member Warren Turner said. "We have enough distractions with people talking on the phone all the time."
There are about 450 billboards in Charlotte, and not all are in compliance with the city's ordinance.
"We've always followed state guidelines," said Bailie Morlidge, a real estate manager for Adams Outdoor Advertising.
Those along highways require state permits, but they also are governed by the city's rules, which aren't as lenient.
For example, the electronic billboards, which look like flat-screen televisions, and the "tri-vision" billboards with slats that flip ads are legal in the city. But under the city's ordinance they are supposed to change ads no more than once every 24 hours. Often they change once every eight seconds, which state law allows, officials said.
There are only a few flat-screen billboards in the city now, said Keith McVean, a Charlotte program zoning manager. Those and tri-vision boards violating the ordinance have been given a violation notice or cited, he said. But zoning administrator Gary Huss couldn't say who received citations or how many. Companies often appeal, which stalls the process, he said. Morlidge said his company, which was cited for its sign, learned it violated the city's ordinance when they started discussing the proposed changes.
Huss acknowledged that the current ordinance has not been consistently enforced.
"I don't have an answer for why," Huss said.
Council member Anthony Foxx said, "This needs to be addressed, whether we change the ordinance or not."

Proposed changes
Adams Outdoor Advertising and Lamar Outdoor Advertising, the two largest billboard companies in the area, sought the ordinance changes in 2005. Planners formed a group of about 35 stakeholders to propose changes.The proposal would allow the electronic and tri-vision billboards to change ads once every eight seconds but would restrict them to industrial zoning along interstates. The changes also limit the height and require more space between billboards.
Charlotte changed its billboard ordinance in 1988 but exempted many existing billboards. If a company wants to put up a new electronic or tri-vision billboard near a billboard that had been grandfathered, it must bring that board into compliance or remove it, McVean said.
Electronic billboards are the future of the industry. Companies are able to promote between four and eight advertisers at a time, officials said. If the changes are approved, Morlidge said, Adams Outdoor would probably increase the number of electronic billboards it has in the city to 12. The company now has one.
Other cities' approaches
"I find the whole medium an invasion, assaulting," said Van Kornegay, a professor of visual communications at the University of South Carolina. "It's ambush advertising."
Columbia officials recently passed a rule that allows companies to put up electronic billboards if they take down old ones. Vornegay, a member of the S.C. Scenic Byway Committee, said Columbia compromised.
"Whenever you come up with these sorts of compromises the industry finds a way to get more up," he said. "The clearest and most effective way to handle (billboards) is to ban them."
Virginia Beach, Va., banned billboards completely in 1986. Since then, billboard companies have been challenging the city's ordinance to allow the new technology, but have lost in court, said Kevin Hershberger, a Virginia Beach zoning inspector.
In Charlotte, council members are most concerned about how the electronic billboards look and how they could affect drivers. Turner and council member Nancy Carter said the flat-screen billboards are distracting.
But a recent study by Virginia Tech's Transportation Institute shows that billboards do not measurably affect driving performance.
"Part of the issue with distractions is your eyes being taken off the road," said Rob Foss of the UNC Highway Safety Research Center. "With billboards, you can at least have peripheral vision on the road."
By allowing the changes to the ordinance, the city could end up with fewer, more effective billboards, council member John Lassiter said.
"We don't prevent people from eating a sausage biscuit, drinking coffee, putting on lipstick and talking on a cell phone, all of which are more distracting than a moveable billboard," he said. "There's a role for outdoor advertising."Plan would alter billboard rules
Source : Charlotte Observer by VICTORIA CHERRIE

Interstate 77 Billboard http://www.charlotteobserver.com/images/video/billboard_77/