ANAHEIM : City to Consider End to Freeway Sign Ban

The City Council will consider a proposal Tuesday to overturn a 25-year ban on freeway billboards.

The item was slated for a vote last week but was delayed because of the absence of Councilman Frank Feldhaus.

Regency Outdoor Advertising Inc. has proposed putting up 10 new freeway signs in the city. Regency has failed four times in the past 10 years to receive city approval for new freeway billboards.

The Regency proposal calls for scattering the signs throughout the city, but concentrating four signs at the junction of the Orange and Riverside freeways. The signs would be up to 60 feet above the roadway and would be up to 950 square feet and at least 500 feet apart.

In exchange for approval, Regency would tear down 13 existing billboards on smaller roadways in the city. The removal of the “old and unsightly structures” would improve street appearances, said Regency President Brian Kennedy in a letter to the City Council last month.

The city Planning Department has opposed Regency’s plan, arguing the roadway signs would diminish freeway appearances and could ruin a $1-million landscaping project. The planning staff also said the Regency proposal would interfere with efforts to enhance the appeal of the city’s resort zones.