Electronic Billboard Legislation Discussed Tomorrow

Tomorrow will come a second public meeting to mull over regulations on digital billboards; details HERE.

A revised proposal by City Planning is HERE. It has been liberalized a bit since the last meeting; for example the "North Shore" is to become a "special signage district".

Find my impressions of that last meeting HERE. I think tomorrow is to be the last major, centralized community meeting before the Planning Department places its imprimatur on new ordinances and submits them to the Planning Commission for approval.

You can and should e-mail any thoughts you may have about the city's regulation of solid-state electronic digital billboards to Dan Sentz, the point-person for the issue over at City Planning, at Dan.Sentz@city.pittsburgh.pa.us. Probably should also cc' Planning director Noor Ismail at Noor.Ismail@city.pittsburgh.pa.us. City Planning says it takes this sort of feedback into account; I know it frequently references doing so.

I didn't head into the last meeting resolved to oppose all digital billboards, believe it or not. There are a couple existent in town already that do not particularly bother me. However, it sounds like if we allow them in some places under some conditions, we will constantly be arguing and litigating over sight lines and "nits" of luminosity and appropriate levels of discretion and a thousand other things. The consultants advised us we should seriously consider an outright ban -- and since we don't seriously gain by allowing these signs either, and potentially have much in the way of civil and aesthetic peace and property values to lose, I think we should take our consultants up on that suggestion and relax for the rest of our lives. That's just my opinion.