LA Council member wants to ban mobile billboards

Sept. 2, 2009 | By Alex Cohen | KPCC
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Los Angeles City Councilman Dennis Zine wants to ban mobile billboards – those supersized ads that trucks tow throughout the city. KPCC’s Alex Cohen has the story.

They’re a form of visual blight. They gobble multiple parking spaces. They’re a hazard to other drivers and pedestrians. Those are some of Councilman Zine’s arguments for outlawing mobile billboards. Many of these portable ads advertise strip clubs or alcohol.

Zine has asked the city attorney and the Department of Transportation to analyze whether it’s legal to ban these ads. The city council’s failed before to outlaw mobile billboards. Advertisers claim the city must give their drivers advance notice of any ban – that would mean posting warning signs on every entrance point into L.A. The billboard companies argue that those signs would generate another kind of blight.

Last month L.A. City Council banned the installation of new digital billboards and supergraphics – multi-story ads that wrap around buildings.

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