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Marc Allinson: A board blog
26 September, 2008
If you walk around any city centre or suburb, you will find that almost every business from the community pub, to the local hardware shop relies on a simple A board outside on the pavement to advertise their offerings.
Now though in the latest piece of council claptrap, someone, probably in order to justify their job, has decided that A boards are bad. They are now worried that blind and partially sighted people may walk into them.
A boards have been part of the town and cityscape for as long as anyone can remember, but nowadays they are under threat. If this ruling is allowed to be upheld, it could set a precedent to be followed throughout the country.
It seems as if a lonely council worker in the basement office of the health and safety department has come to the conclusion that of the approximately 2.5% of people in the country who are either blind or visually impaired, there are a large enough number of them who walk around without a helper, guide dog or even a stick, and these few people may inadvertently walk into something with a surface area of about two square meters. This risk is so great that they have come to the conclusion that these valuable aids to the businesses in the city must be removed, never mind the adverse effect the ruling may have on shops, pubs and other businesses, and the knock on effect on jobs and business prosperity and therefore ability to pay the rates that fund these health and safety worker’s wages.
They also seem to have missed all the bins, post boxes, telecommunications boxes, bollards and bicycle racks that littler the cityscape. The difference is that the A boards are not charged land rent, nor do they belong to the council.
In the case of mine and most of the other businesses in my local area, we are based in very old listed buildings, meaning it is not possible to make a great impact with the frontage of the building, so without the additional in your face signage, it is difficult to be noticed.
One of the food led pubs near to me was without an A board for a couple of weeks and noticed a 25% drop off in trade. There are also a lot of small specialist shops tucked away down the little snickets and alleyways throughout the city. These places would be near enough impossible to find without their A boards pointing you in their direction, yet many have already been told to remove theirs.
I have heard that there is an old ruling saying that you have the right to use the first meter in front of your land, but I don’t have any details on this. If anyone has any information on this, please let me know.
Maybe it is now time for people to take responsibility for their own actions and accept that there is risk in life, however insignificant. The councils cannot wrap everybody in cotton wool; they have to let us have some freedom to run our businesses. Fair enough, there should be guidelines, such as perhaps no outside standalone sign can protrude more than a third of the way across the pavement, with a maximum size of maybe one meter.
I’m off to a meeting with the councillors and local business leaders about this matter next week, lets hope we can encourage them to change their mind.
Readers' comments
Marc I had the same trouble 18months ago with Richmond Council & fought them. They published guidlines about obstructions on the pavement. I used their own guidlines to prove that my A board was within them and threatened to take them to court to remove a traffic light control box and a fixed wastepaper bin that were in contravention to their own rules. I contacted local press etc and got a coloured photo front page with me my board and a surveyors rule. I received loads of support locally and the council backed down. I insisted they confirm in writing with the fact that their obstacles were only aloud to remain with my permission. Victory for a change.
We too have had the same issue, despite the fact that our board is placed in front of the porch-like bit of our pub that people have to walk around anyway. Slightly off topic, but god forgive me if i ever dare ask the sweepers to clear the mess by the bus stop outside of take-away wrappers etc. So I can't advertise, but i can clean up for them, sweet.
As you say Marc, These people have to find a reason, every week or so, to justify why they have a job. Obviously this decision must have come after the jobsworth had too many of tescos own brand lagers at home the night before, and after looking through the window of the over paid office at the council the A board must have been the closest thing he/she could see. Easy when you dont have to get off your arse to earn a living. Get a real job, leave tradition alone, along with everything else that isnt broken. I mentioned this to my grandmother, who cant recognise me at 3ft away, and she just laughed her head off, they might be hard of sight, but they aint stupid, If this persons so concered about the blind, quit and ask the council to give you salary to guide dogs for the blind, as painful as the truth is, they'll do a better job than the councils "danger spotters" anyday.