Petition submitted to halve billboard advertising in Zurich
On Thursday, the Zurich-based interest group Plakat, Raum, Gesellschaft (IG PRG) submitted a petition to City Councilor Kathrin Martelli calling for a 50 percent reduction in advertising space in Zurich. The goal of the initiative: a more attractive cityscape.
The Zurich interest group Plakat, Raum, Gesellschaft (IG PRG) submitted a petition to City Councillor Kathrin Martelli on Thursday to halve the amount of advertising space in Zurich. The aim of the exercise: a more attractive cityscape. According to SDA, the resulting revenue for the city is in the per mille range of the budget. In their opinion, this is disproportionate to the negative impact of poster advertising on the cityscape. The association criticizes the dominance of poster companies in public spaces. The petition calls for half of the more than 8,000 advertising spaces in the city to be removed. At the same time, it demands a ban on the licensing of billboard advertising on private property. The petition was signed by a total of 567 people. The Tages-Anzeiger once ran the headline: "More advertising than a train station", wrote the initiators, describing a development that has increasingly affected the city of Zurich: The appropriation of public space and the encroachment of advertising spaces on the cityscape. Advertising is everywhere, and new ones appear every day: at streetcar and bus stops, often moving and illuminated, on house walls, along the streets, in underpasses, on video screens and building-sized "megaposters". Advertising posters follow advertising posters and fight for the attention of passers-by - with the effect that they are no longer noticed at all. The initiators are therefore convinced that not only the cityscape would benefit from a reduction in billboard advertising, but also the advertisers themselves.
