Friday, May 25th, 2007 ::: Street Studies

Welcome back to Street Studies, where we walk down a particular street in the City and examine the illegal signs on the roadside. Church is a den of illegal wall signs and it boasts three examples of billboard permit fraud where we have been able to get an improperly issued billboard permit revoked.

76 Church - Titan Fascia on Mural Permit

We recently had this sign removed. This photo was taken on March 18, 2007:

The vinyl fascia sign was operating under this mural permit issued in June 2006, which allows only painted signage. Paint was never put to the wall.

97 Church and 103 Church - Titan Fascia on Mural Permit Strategic Media Fascia With No Permit

This is sooo typical of the difference between Strategic Media and Titan. Both signs are equally illegal in our books.

We had both signs removed by April 9, 2007:

Titan’s sign, advertising Saab, is operating under this mural permit issued in February 1993. Paint was never put on the wall.

SM’s illegal sign, advertising Playstation, has no permit whatsoever.

Strategic Media was quite upset after the City took enforcement action against their Playstation sign at 103 Church in the fall of 2006. This resulted in Strategic Media’s Daniel Pitoscia filing a freedom of information enquiry (FOI 06-4540) asking for the law enforcement file for the complaint against his illegal sign. Pitoscia applied for a permit for his illegal sign, but was unable to obtain one because 103 Church Street was listed historical by City Council in 1986 and you can’t put billboards on historic properties.

As for the Titan sign, the illegal vinyl sign was inspected and improperly cleared by the building inspector who didn’t appreciate the difference between a mural and a fascia sign. Here are his notes:

On April 24, 2006, Inspector 19315 writes after inspecting a vinyl sign: “Attended site noted vinyl sign on the south cntr to obtain new permit if mural or vinyl sign is greater than permit. Permit cleared and closed.” After we filed a complaint the sign was ordered removed. Inspectors have since been given a tutorial on the signs by-law.

20 Lombard - At Church, Illegal Pattison Pillar

There are two Pattison Pillars on this property. This one is on the Church Street frontage. The un-nameplated ground sign in the background is very suspicious and it is currently under investigation.

254 Church - Illegal Tri-Vision Ground Sign

An old Urban Outdoor backlit structure has been entirely removed and replaced with this illegal tri-vision. This entire structure is illegal.

260 Church - Titan Fascia on Mural Permit

This is what it looked like in the fall of 2006:

Pursuant to enforcement action, Titan removed the illegal vinyl by November 24, 2006, when we took this photo:

The illegal structure was maintained, so was the Titan nameplate. However, both the nameplate and the structure were removed by March 20, 2007 when we took this photo:

Titan has applied for a variance to maintain its vinyl fascia sign at this location. The sign requires a variance to 60M separation requirements - it is located within 60M of at least two permitted third party signs, including the Pattison ground sign at 254 Church. This mural permit for 260 Church was issued to Steve Gallo of Cieslok outdoor in 2003. Paint was never put on the wall. Steve is now the illegal vinyl sign point man for Grant Sign Service where he recently supervised the purchase of GSS’s new flatbed printer.

That’s it for now. All the action is actually above Dundas.

From this month’s Scenic America newsletter: Bill Maher’s New Rules: Video billboards. Read about an illegal wall wrap in Philly, read Billboards vs. A ‘Greener’ America by Neal Peirce; read about Vancouver’s struggle to prevent video billboards from being erected on abutting, former railway land transferred to Native sovereignty.