Barcelona Is Targeting Billboards It Sees as 'Pollution'

While some might think I am crazy, or just a little to "passionate", about how our public spaces are used by the OOH industry, I give you the below article. I feel like the recent rise in legitimate questioning of advertisings assumed right to our public environment by local governments and individuals, is giving credence to my craziness. Beyond being harmful to our collective psyche, are we simply giving it all away too cheaply? Why subject ourselves to the whims of an industry hellbent on using our attention to create vast wealth that they then extract away from our cities, leaving them crowded with imagery that no one wants to see, and devoid of the individual character that makes each beautiful concrete jungle its own. Barcelona mayor Colau doesn't see the problem in black and white but he sure does understand that Barcelona is getting the short end of the stick.

"Across the board, Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau’s administration has been fighting to cut back on what it sees as commercial exploitation of the city."

VIA: The Atlantic City Lab

Flickr/Serge Melki

Public advertising is pollution and it needs to be curbed. So insists a new policy from Barcelona, which will substantially cut back on how much advertising City Hall permits in public places. In a bid to make Barcelona a more attractive, less aesthetically cluttered place, street advertising in the city will be reduced by 20 percent in July 2016. More [HERE] El Pais Article [HERE]