Residents post 'Notice of Violation' on 2 billboards considered illegal on Bathurst near Davenport
CBC
Some Toronto residents, fed up with what they consider inaction by city hall, postered over two billboards they believe are illegal in the west end on Friday to create one large "Notice of Violation" message.
The message in large lettering comes after 15 years of requests by residents to city hall to remove the signs on the west side of Bathurst Street north of Davenport Road.
Dave Meslin, a concerned neighbour, said a few people who live in the ward felt that they had no choice but to take matters into their own hands.
"We noticed a lot of billboards in our ward didn't have permits. We targeted this one just as an experiment and asked city staff to take them down," Meslin told CBC Toronto on Monday.
"They sent a notice of violation to the billboard company in 2006. But they only used a 24-point font. We thought, maybe we need to use a 24,000-point font, because clearly, the message didn't get across the first time."
Meslin said there are hundreds of billboards in Toronto, and 15 years ago, residents teamed up with urban planning students from Ryerson University to do an audit of billboards in the ward. They found out that the majority of them didn't have clear permits.
"There's definitely dozens of illegal corporate billboards in Toronto and we think city hall should enforce the bylaws and take them down. I mean, it's called public space for a reason. This is our space, not theirs."
WATCH | Residents take matters into their own hands:
Meslin said residential neighbourhoods do not need "visual pollution" that comes from commercial advertising.
"In public space, if we are going to have boards up with signs, it should be art made by the local high school kids, it should be messages from the local church, or synagogue, or mosque, or residents' association," Meslin said.
"It could be just a big bulletin board for people to put message up. The last thing we need in our residential neighbourhood is just more corporate signage."
Documents released by the city in response to a Freedom of Information request show the billboards have been there since at least 1951.
In 2006, the city issued a Notice of Violation to Mediacom Inc., now known as CBS Outdoor, a division of CBS Canada Holdings Inc., saying it did not have a signed permit for the billboards in contravention of the Toronto Municipal Code. The billboards are located on 25 Burnside Dr.
According to CBS Outdoor, the billboards have "legal non-conforming status." On its website, the City of Toronto says that status "exists when the zoning for the site does not permit its current use, but this use was permitted and in existence prior to the enactment of the current zoning bylaw."
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