Eric Morath / The Detroit News
If you haven't noticed digital billboards yet, you must be keeping your eyes on the road.
CBS Outdoor installed one of the 48-foot-wide LED boards earlier this week at Interstate 75 and State Fair Avenue in Detroit. There is another about two miles south, and still more of the blinking behemoths have cropped up along I-275 and I-94.
Advertising firms love the $450,000 digital screens composed of tens of thousand of tiny lights because they are easily customized and can serve four to six clients at a time.
Others call them distractions and eyesores, and some towns in other states have banned them from roadsides.
Advantages of the digital boards range from a better quality of image when compared with traditional signs to easier installation of ads. Consider the difference between rolling out 600 square feet of vinyl in the snow and ice versus creating a new image with a few clicks of the mouse.
"There are times in January where it can take a week or two to get a crew out to change a sign," said Tom Carroll, the Detroit-based Midwest vice president for CBS Outdoor. Now, ads can change in minutes via an Internet connection.
That's an efficient way to multiply revenue. CBS is charging clients comparable rates for the cutting edge board as it does for its traditional signs, but its Detroit billboard this week was serving three clients, running a total of four ads.
Some want 'eyesores' to go
One client, Ram Real Estate, was attracted by the flexibility and uniqueness. "If we're running a special promotion we can call and have our ad updated," said Ram sales associate Brienne Balliet. "We thought the digital sign would catch a lot of eyes on I-75, especially with the Lodge closed."
Not everyone is as enthusiastic about the new signage.
Detroit should brace for Las Vegas-style eyesores that could lead to traffic accidents, said Kevin Fry, president of Scenic America, a Washington-based opponent of the new signs.
"Your eye is drawn to these things every six seconds it's like a giant PowerPoint in the sky," he said. Fry said the billboards are likely to distract drivers from the road for more than two seconds -- the amount of time some studies have shown is dangerous for motorists to look at cell phones or iPods.
Municipalities in Pennsylvania, Illinois and elsewhere have fought the signage. None in Michigan has yet contacted the state Department of Transportation, which regulates billboards. State lawmakers did update regulations this year to say digital signs must dim at night and may not exceed a certain brightness.
The advertising industry defends the boards and says the devices can be used for Amber Alerts and public safety messages.
Motorists like technology
Many motorists find them to be fun, but not distracting, said Jeremy Johnson, digital billboard sales manger for South Dakota-based Daktronics. His company makes some of the digital boards going up in Metro Detroit. They also produce scoreboards and video walls for sports stadiums using similar technology.
"We don't want to create any negative safety environment," Johnson said. "The industry is conscious of that. There are no videos and we work to make them look as much like traditional billboards as possible."
If you haven't noticed digital billboards yet, you must be keeping your eyes on the road.
CBS Outdoor installed one of the 48-foot-wide LED boards earlier this week at Interstate 75 and State Fair Avenue in Detroit. There is another about two miles south, and still more of the blinking behemoths have cropped up along I-275 and I-94.
Advertising firms love the $450,000 digital screens composed of tens of thousand of tiny lights because they are easily customized and can serve four to six clients at a time.
Others call them distractions and eyesores, and some towns in other states have banned them from roadsides.
Advantages of the digital boards range from a better quality of image when compared with traditional signs to easier installation of ads. Consider the difference between rolling out 600 square feet of vinyl in the snow and ice versus creating a new image with a few clicks of the mouse.
"There are times in January where it can take a week or two to get a crew out to change a sign," said Tom Carroll, the Detroit-based Midwest vice president for CBS Outdoor. Now, ads can change in minutes via an Internet connection.
That's an efficient way to multiply revenue. CBS is charging clients comparable rates for the cutting edge board as it does for its traditional signs, but its Detroit billboard this week was serving three clients, running a total of four ads.
Some want 'eyesores' to go
One client, Ram Real Estate, was attracted by the flexibility and uniqueness. "If we're running a special promotion we can call and have our ad updated," said Ram sales associate Brienne Balliet. "We thought the digital sign would catch a lot of eyes on I-75, especially with the Lodge closed."
Not everyone is as enthusiastic about the new signage.
Detroit should brace for Las Vegas-style eyesores that could lead to traffic accidents, said Kevin Fry, president of Scenic America, a Washington-based opponent of the new signs.
"Your eye is drawn to these things every six seconds it's like a giant PowerPoint in the sky," he said. Fry said the billboards are likely to distract drivers from the road for more than two seconds -- the amount of time some studies have shown is dangerous for motorists to look at cell phones or iPods.
Municipalities in Pennsylvania, Illinois and elsewhere have fought the signage. None in Michigan has yet contacted the state Department of Transportation, which regulates billboards. State lawmakers did update regulations this year to say digital signs must dim at night and may not exceed a certain brightness.
The advertising industry defends the boards and says the devices can be used for Amber Alerts and public safety messages.
Motorists like technology
Many motorists find them to be fun, but not distracting, said Jeremy Johnson, digital billboard sales manger for South Dakota-based Daktronics. His company makes some of the digital boards going up in Metro Detroit. They also produce scoreboards and video walls for sports stadiums using similar technology.
"We don't want to create any negative safety environment," Johnson said. "The industry is conscious of that. There are no videos and we work to make them look as much like traditional billboards as possible."
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