In response to our story on shelter advertising, Bill Brinton has a very different take on the encroachment of ads into public space.

The citizens of many cities in this country desire to improve their communities’ appearances and to reduce sign clutter along roadways.  In November 2009, an overwhelming majority of voters in San Francisco approved a ballot initiative to halt the placement of ads on transit furniture.  Cities like Houston, TX and Arlington, VA, hard at work in improving their communities’ appearance, do not allow advertising on transit furniture. 

While some cities do allow curbside advertisements that target passing drivers, the fact is that the ads distract drivers from the task of driving, diverting their attention to ads for fast food, personal injury lawyers, and an array of commercial products and services.  In 2008, an expert for Clear Channel Outdoor noted the distraction caused by such advertisements because they force drivers to read them at shorter distances than billboards.

The City of Orlando still prohibits advertisements on downtown shelters because city leaders know that beauty is good for business.  There is no doubt that roadside ads erode a community’s interest in visual enhancement.   In December 2009, a federal court in New Jersey observed that a city’s interest in aesthetics was diminished by allowing an exemption for bus shelter advertising.

In Jacksonville, voters went to the polls in 1987 to approve a citizens’ initiative to halt further billboard construction.  It should be no surprise that Keep Jacksonville Beautiful, Greenscape, The City Beautiful Coalition, Inc. and other visual enhancement and neighborhood organizations vigorously opposed plans to place advertising on bus shelters that will admittedly “target” Jacksonville residents and drivers.  Jacksonville Transportation Authority’s Board Chair acknowledged that these ads will increase visual clutter, and opened the door to discussions to find alternatives.  This was a good sign (pardon the pun).

Some neighborhoods were exempted from the controversial scheme, while other neighborhoods were not spared.  But if some parts of a city are free to advance the goal of beautification, shouldn’t all parts have that opportunity?  One does not need to diminish roadside beauty to improve transportation amenities.  It is a false choice.  Just as landscaping and streetscaping are part of sound transportation planning, street furniture should also be taken into account and not made into the Yellow Pages.

Gulf to Bay Blvd, Clearwater, Florida, then and now.

Thomas Jefferson is reported to have said that cities should be surrounded continuously by a maximum of beauty.  The battle for beauty repeats itself over and over as citizens struggle to improve their communities.  Transportation planners and agencies must pay close attention to this struggle, and reject any scheme that does not advance both beauty and transportation.  They are not mutually exclusive.  In his last public appearance before his death, the late Charles Kuralt spoke these words: 

“America does not belong to the franchisers and the developers and spoilers who do not give a damn about their country.  The land is ours.  Ordinary Americans, I am persuaded of this with all my heart, ordinary Americans want a beautiful country.”

Here is an open question for the transportation community: will you give ordinary Americans a beautiful country or one that is awash in clutter and visual pollution?

William D. Brinton is a board member of  Scenic America .