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Kevin Fry, the president of Scenic America, was interviewed in The Planning Report about the Los Angeles billboard situation. Excerpt:
The city of Los Angeles has surrendered its built environment to advertising and sign companies. That�s a terrible tragedy for L.A. and the whole country, because what�s playing out in L.A. is happening on a smaller scale in other places....Los Angeles probably has the worst billboard problem in the country. No one knows exactly how many billboards there are in L.A. because the industry has prevented the city from counting them, which was the source of a series of lawsuits that were settled a couple of years ago. There is a minimum of 10,000 to 11,000 billboards in the city, of which probably a minimum of one-third are illegal. Signs have been put up without permits, in the wrong place, and are of the wrong size. The outdoor advertising companies, with the aid of willfully blind or inept public officials, have allowed the outdoor advertising industry to simply take over the street and put up signs wherever it feels like....
The difference between Los Angeles and other cities is that other places have taken the enforcement role seriously.
Ban Billboard Blight has been putting pressure on local politicians to try controlling signs for a change.