Find the illegal billboard near you

There are a million billboards in the naked city (well, not quite) and about 4,000 of them are illegal. Now comes a handy searchable database to help you fight for a less cluttered skyscape. Here's the story, from the LA Weekly:

Last April, LA Weekly went to Los Angeles Superior Court to force the city to hand over public information about the locations of thousands of potentially illegal billboards erected without permits or formal safety inspections. Over the objections of Clear Channel Outdoor and CBS Outdoor, a judge ruled that the public had the right to these sought-after and plainly public lists.

But the lists failed to show which of the billboards were illegal, so Jim Bursch, publisher of West LA Online, took on the remarkable task of creating a searchable billboard database. He's got photos, too.

There's a lot of cash at stake, the Weekly points out in a previous story:

Billboard companies reap roughly $14,000 a month in easy money from a double-sided standard-size 14-by-48-foot billboard that costs about $50,000 to $80,000 to build. And they earn up to $128,000 monthly from "digital" billboards, oil wells in the sky that, when fully leased with ads, will earn $1.34 billion a year for L.A.'s billboard giants. These riches will flow to the very firms that have vociferously fought paying a single penny into an annual, modest, $186-per-billboard municipal fee — which their lawyers hammered down from $314.

Bursch's database tips the balance of power into residents hands, your hands. What are you going to do with it?

-- Veronique de Turenne

Photo: Los Angeles Times

Comments

[JR]

If you say I as a taxpaying citizen has the power, I would get rid of all the billboards. If we just passed a law to not use cell phones cause of distractions, then what are the billboards intensions? To distract drivers for advertising purposes.

[PC]

In Spain, billboards along major highways are considered distractions and traffic safety hazards and are prohibited.

[Barbara Broide]

One sad correction to make to Ms. de Turenne's excellent comments: The inspection fee for billboards was indeed reduced as a result of the outdoor advertising industry's challenge to the original fee established as part of the 2002 off-site advertising ordinance adopted by the City. The inspection fee defined in the billboard settlement is noted as $ 186. HOWEVER, that is not an annual fee. It is an inspection fee that covers the inital THREE year period following the settlement. If you do the math, you will find that the fee is actually just $ 62 per year! That is why the Dept. of Building and Safety has estimated that it will take over 2 1/2 years to complete the initial billboard inventory.

One cannot be anything but amazed, disappointed and frustrated to know that the City's leadership could not and/or would not hold the line and insist upon an inspection fee that could actually get the job done in a timely manner. (Also remember that with inflation and cost of living increases, by the time that the third year kicks in the value of the $ 62 will be diminished.)

[Richard Davidson]

I love the big digital billboards. We have a new one across from our building. The colors are beautiful and they give the night sky a mysterious glow. They remind me of Second Life. Those who object to these billboards now will learn to appreciate them eventually.

[WB]

Why don't we see a stronger legal attack on these?

These unquestionably cause death, traffic and property devaluation- and for the profit of those who already have a market supressing advantage.

There is no business arguement or benefit that makes the cost in lives acceptable.

It reminds me of the death panel claims. What do they think private insurance companies are? They are firms that raise rates and deny services inorder to gamble on risky investments. When they win they keep the difference when they lose they act like its their duty to pass on the cost and succeed in doing so by collusion.