Visual blight can be found everywhere, from the calm banks of a riverfront to along a highway to atop the corner store roof.  It can take many forms, from the abandoned warehouse along the waterfront to the liquor billboard in the convenience store parking lot.  Vacant buildings represent past vibrancy that has since been lost, usually a sign of local neglect.  Abandoned buildings typically translate into fewer neighbors on the street, which makes residents feel less safe.  Thanks to the rebirth of many downtowns and community initiatives to restore their own neighborhoods, vacant structures are urban design opportunities now more than ever before.

Blight can be a sign that a neighborhood does not have strong enough urban design controls, or a particular urban form that has faded in popularity.  Most forms of billboard blight are actually illegal, but they remain due to the lack of zoning enforcement.  Only a sweeping reform of the code could address these problems of neglect.  Billboard blight can also reduce a city’s visual character and quality of life.  Though billboard advertising is not typically considered part of the urban design discipline, a building or a street corner must be designed in a certain way to provide the space for a billboard.  Such blight is more frequently found in lower-income neighborhoods, where controls are minimal.

http://www.urbanblight.org/index.html
http://www.freepress.net/
http://tinyurl.com/ymnoug
http://www.urbanblight.org/SRC/index.html
http://www.urbanblight.org/resources/Tools.pdf

A sea of billboards                                                     SCRUB photo