Cherry Blossoms? Nope. Sidewalk Ads.

Yeeeesh. What a slippery slope. Do they do permit this in other cities? If so, has it stayed contained or gotten out of hand?

I just think that CityVista should behave like a true stakeholder in the neighborhood. Putting illegal signs all over our parks and sidewalks is simply creating litter and showing disrespect to the community that they are joining. They would have had so much more impact if they had used their advertising dollars to do something that benefitted the area. How about a gatorade/water stop in the 6th and Mass. Ave. park for instance for the joggers, visitors and dogs? Our area needs many things that they could contribute to and get advertising — these mat signs need to go.

it doesnt bother me..
i know what a hard time real estate folks are having and personally.. ive always been a fan of guerrilla marketing… as long as they dont leave them there… im sure they didnt mean to do anything “illegal” … i bet they thought it was super “creative” and “out of the box”….but umm… sadly…it just isnt..
xoxo

Personally, I find them infinitely more palatable than the posters glued on lamp posts, electric boxes, etc, and the stake-mounted placards littering every street corner. At least you can avoid seeing these by not staring at the ground.

Now if only placing these signs on the ground would magically speed the opening of the Safeway…

One of the reasons for having a permit process for such commercial speech is to prevent the sidewalks and other public places from being cluttered with these unsightly advertisements. #1 was dead on that this is a very slipperly slope and one that should not be tolerated by the DDOT. Setting a precedent of lax or no enforcement will only lead to more advertising and we already have enough. You want to advertise, pay to do so on an billboard or other established area for such activity.

Placing these advertisements on street corners is also a safety issue for pedestrians and drivers in our neighborhood, one that should not be tolerated.

I would think that someone looking to shell out several hundred thousand dollars in the condo market would already have availed themselves of the opportunity to educate themselves as to what’s out there – we’re not talking about impulse purchasing, after all here. So what possible sales benefit they can possibly get from fliers pasted on the ground?
If they’re just trying to announce themselves to the neighborhood, they’ve picked an obnoxious way to do it.

If the neighborhood is going to provide public space (like sidewalks) for commercial interests, it should be part of a plan and also benefit the community. Putting an advertising mat in the park (as I saw at both 6th and Mass and Mt. Vernon Square) takes away from those public spaces. Instead — would it not have been better to buy something for the park (i.e. lighting, nicer benches) and put a small plaque that shows their sponsorship? If a commercial interest such as City Vista is going to use public space, it should not only be with a permit but should be at a charge so that the public benefits from giving up their space. And I don’t think that CityVista has been removing their signs from the sidewalks and parks. I know of many PQ residents who have been cleaning them up themselves.

I love getting the sometimes useful information this page provides, but like many have said before, the PQ area is in such a nanny state, I don’t understand why so many have chosen to move into the city. The neighborhood has much bigger problems than these ads on the sidewalk. How about the people sleeping on them, and using them as public restrooms? Until those problems are solved, this is a non-issue. Who cares for better parks and nicer benches, when you can never sit on them because they are occupied by squaters. This isn’t even a “broken windows” issue here.

Cheers to Denver2dc…you hit the nail on the head.

I am tired of seeing the homeless guy use the alley behind my building as his personal restroom…day and night.

The gray blankets piled up in doorways of all the abandoned storefronts in the area, as well as Verizon Center, are a much bigger problem.

The homeless problem in this area is a bigger problem than little squares of advertisments on the sidewalk.

What #8 said.

I don’t see it as clutter. Yet.

How do you feel about posters in storefront windows? Does that feel cluttery?

Okay — so now we don’t take care of anything until we take care of the homeless issue????? A major developer in our area needs to be held to a high standard. I don’t believe that there are some things we should enforce and others that we don’t. I personally don’t want commercial advertising everywhere (which is why we have laws!!). This developer doesn’t need to litter our sidewalks and they need to pay for their advertising space. A permit is a permit and they don’t have any permits.

Oh, for reals. I mean, homeless guys are waaay more unsightly than some ad on the ground. Sweep the big trash first!

Christ.

I love it when people reply with “there are bigger problems here”. It’s the most original solution to a problem.

Maybe we should just talk about the homeless problem everyday until it gets resolved?

Sorry but I didn’t mean to say that in a mean way.

#5, your comment about DDOT “tolerating” this is well taken, but DDOT has no interest in what is good for our neighborhood or not. Once they figure a way to get a few bucks out of this, they will. They won’t consult us or care what we think.

This is the same agency that issued permits for the Barnum & Baily, Ringley Bros. circus to park their containers all over our public streets during their run at the Verizon Center. Moreover, the circus parked these containers illegally as well — such as in front of a fire hydrant and in a no-parking entrance to a condo building — but where was DDOT? Counting the money, perhaps, but certainly not monitoring the situation.

Never mind that there are residents in the neighborhood; never mind that there are visitors and residents looking for scarce street parking. Never mind that our tax dollars fund these streets. DDOT just plows ahead, does not consult residents and local businesses and takes money from for-profit entities to hand over public space.

DDOT is incompetent, out of touch and out of control. Why Mayor Fenty lets these mavericks operate with so little oversight is amazing to me. Remind you of another city agency?

To those suggesting that by identifying larger problems is a solution to the “problem” ads, I suggest trying to understand the problems and solutions of the neighborhood on a deeper level than trying to have a witty retort. This blog and others like it offer opportunities for neigbors to present different views and get behind various issue. I would go so far as to argue that this particular blog was essential to cleaning up the area in front of Chipotle and McD’s on 7th and G. It’s great that other issues are brought up here than homelessness, but a major theme of the post is city government agency competence. If the city can not address the glaring problems of the neighborhood, why should we expect them to handle the minor ones? Also, just this morning I was walking down 7th near G Street when a homeless man, clearly in need of help began cursing and threatening those inside McD’s from the outside. To me, that is a greater threat than sidewalk ads, and if there is an opportunity to create some sort of revenue for the city through them, why not?

#16 — that is a totally different point. IF the city charged for the space, then we should consider selling ads. I personally don’t like the idea of everything becoming commercial space in our area. But CityVista is confiscating free public space for their purposes and putting ads also in parks. I will never support anything but a tasteful plaque in a park that shows that someone purchased something. CityVista needs to use the money to improve the neighborhood. Homeless people or not — we need to start supporting a standard of conduct for all — corporate citizens as well as individuals in our area. Somewhere along the line, folks on this blog started thinking that downtown equals chaos (so noted by all the remarks about moving to the suburbs). I’ve lived in many downtowns and DC is way behind them in how they balance the living, working, playing aspects.

Perhaps we can kill two birds with one stone. Have CityVista provide the homeless clothing with advertisements for their property on it. In exchange the homeless will receive shelter in the sales office at night. Win. Win.

Jason…

You WIN! You have the most innovative solution.

I think Thais’s idea about having CityVista (or other corporate entities) purchase lamps, benches, etc, and receive a plaque in return is one worth consideration. However, I can also see such an occurrence generating much heat from PQ residents objecting to that, as well. It’s similar to environmentalists who object to using oil/coal to generate electricity, but also object to wind power (ugly and hurts birds), hydropower (hurts fish), tidal power (hurts seaweed), etc. The never ending pursuit of perfection will get us nowhere.

#20: I think you’re missing the point. Advertisers in PQ have been getting bolder and more blatant in the past months/years. The real issue here is using our public space for the purpose of advertising dollars.

How is #20 missing the point exactly? #20 praised a contributors’ potential solution to the problem of the use of public space for private gain and anticipated the likely reaction to that solution on this board. The analogy is a bit exaggerated, but instead of bi&%*ing about this, let’s come up with more constructive solutions.

There’s an interesting article on the city’s plans for addressing homelessness in today’s Post, which will affect the PQ area:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/02/AR2008040202287.html

With respect to #17: “If the city can not address the glaring problems of the neighborhood, why should we expect them to handle the minor ones?” I understand this view, but I look at it in the reverse — if the city is not competent enough to promptly address small, blatantly illegal (assuming here there are no permits), actions, how will they ever take on larger issues? In other words, if it takes DDOT a year to paint a crosswalk, how long do you think it will take them to retime a light, fix a dangerous intersection, or fix the NY Avenue corridor?

I believe all laws should be enforced and we should simply expect our agencies to do their jobs.

Another note – the CityVista ads extend all the way to the Metro at the Convention Center.

I also just noticed one of these sidewalk ads for DC United at 6th and H, if I recall correctly (SW corner of the WMATA block). I didn’t mind these ads at first, and still don’t mind ones in front of the Verizon Center for VC events, but I can see how this could easily get out of hand.

Cary #23 — I’m #17 and did not say the quote that you cited. My point is in total agreement with your point. So huh?????

Sorry Joan — I was quoting from #16. I completely agree with your comments.

I threw away two more City Vista mats this past weekend but saw also a number of radio station mat ads concentrated around Verizon Center (not great but at least better than all over the neighborhood like City Vista). My question is for the lawyers that read this blog — if a mat ad is placed that gets slick in the rain and causes me to slip on the sidewalk, can I sue the ad agency that put it there and the company that hired them to do the advertising?