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Auto dealer Richard Kim was hoping to attract more business when he put up a colorful hot air balloon advertising his car lot to motorists on the Santa Monica Freeway.
What he got instead was a $250 fine for violating Los Angeles' new sign law.
Kim was the first person to be prosecuted under the law-for violating a prohibition on advertising that "constitutes a hazard to the safe and efficient operation of vehicles upon a street or freeway." He also spent $3,000 for a balloon that he cannot use.
In all, about 500 merchants have been ordered to bring their signs into conformance with the law, which will be a year old on July 5. Countless others have been blocked from erecting new signs. In one case, the McDonald's hamburger chain was stopped from posting its trademark golden arches sign at a location in the San Fernando Valley-too many signs already were there, authorities said. In another, a painter was cited for adorning an outside wall in Hollywood with an 85-foot-tall promotional mural for an aspiring actress.
Virtually No Limits
Except for a ban on signs that can be "viewed primarily" from Los Angeles freeways, adopted by the City Council in the 1950s, there were virtually no limits on the location and size of signs before the law was passed last year. Permits had been required to make sure that signs were installed safely. Aesthetics were not considerations.
However, as a casual glance can tell, there has been no discernible lessening in the number of large billboards and other signs vying for consumers' attention across most of the city. The 1986 ordinance, the culmination of a 20-year struggle by environmentalists and homeowners, states as a goal the reduction of "visual pollution" from too many signs. Yet the signs are seemingly as thick as ever.
Results of the 1986 law, its backers say, will become apparent in time, as more and more offices and stores are built or renovated under the new restrictions. The new rules do not govern the vast majority of signs that went up before the ordinance was approved.
Only since then has the law required new billboards to be 200 feet from homes on the same side of the street. It...