Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Flashy signs are great, but let's not get carried away

The recent announcement that 50-foot electronic billboards will soon loom over the southern portion of downtown Phoenix is fine, but a couple boosters went way overboard in their praise of the move.

"The point is...to really put some excitement on Jefferson Street," claimed Judd Norris, the guy who's going to head up the billboard district.
Phoenix City Manager David Cavazos went him one better.

"It's going to activate downtown. That was one of the best ideas I had all year."

I don't have a problem with the signs, at least conceptually. But these guys are wildly delusional that a few bright signs are going to liven up Jefferson, let alone rejuvenate downtown. You need housing, restaurants, shops and offices to do that. It helps if they face the street, too. Too bad the city helped kill part of Jefferson when they approved the inward-facing CityScape project, which turns the back end of CVS and Oakville Grocery to Jefferson between Central and First Street.

1 comment:

Steve said...

I toured the area after the All-Star Game. For the life of me, I can't see any sort of major difference in the area the city said they were planning to tart up. I do see a coupe extra advertisements,but not thing else.

If this is Mr.Cavazos best idea of the year,it speaks volumes as to the level of quality ideas the city is encouraging.