The billboard battle is here
Austin should still make TxDOT pay.
Tomorrow is a big test for billboards.
It looks like there are the votes to greenlight code changes to enable digital wayfinding kiosks on public property. Planning Commission Chair Alice Woods' concerns about the encroachment of advertising into public spaces have fallen on deaf ears. These digital signs are essentially big touchscreens that theoretically serve a public function but also generate revenue by broadcasting digital ads. The city would split the revenue with IKE Smart City, the company operating the signs.
What's less clear is what Council will do about CM Chito Vela's proposal to make it easier to relocate existing billboards that have been condemned by transportation projects, such as the I-35 expansion or Project Connect.
Vela was initially adamant about pairing the measures, but yesterday he yielded to colleagues and gave up on the One Big Beautiful Billboard Bill.
To recap: New billboards have been prohibited in Austin for 40 years. They can be relocated, however, under a strict set of circumstances. The proposal is to loosen those restrictions for billboard relocated due to major transportation projects.
In an email to City Council members, Billy Reagan, CEO of Reagan Outdoor Advertising, the Utah-based company that owns the great majority of Austin's billboards, insisted that fears about the relocation of signs into residential neighborhoods along I-35 were unfounded.
