Bendigo Council loses battle to stop electronic ‘eyesore’ billboard

Bendigo Council has lost its bid to ban an electronic eyesore facing one of the town’s historic landmarks, with a Melbourne company accusing it of “prejudice”.

Bendigo Council has lost its bid to ban an electronic eyesore facing one of the town’s historic landmarks.

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal gave Melbourne media company, Citizen Outdoor, the green light to install a 6m by 2.95m LED sign on the corner of Mitchell and Wills St.

The tribunal found Bendigo council failed to determine the application for the 17.7 sqm sign, which will be installed above the building currently used by Snooze.

Council argued the 17.7 sqm LED billboard would become a visual eyesore in the city heart, however Citizen Outdoor said this was anti-signage “prejudice”.

Council said it would have refused the development as it would “unreasonably impact” on the amenity, character and the visual appearance of the area.

The Wills St building is not heritage protected, but the council argued the sign would blare onto the historic former Hopetoun Hotel.

“The proposed sign, of such a scale and placement with a scrolling image, would be a distraction by drawing your eye away from the significant heritage building,” it said.

“Due to its location, scale and design, the sign would be highly visible from the surrounding area, and that it fails to respond to the character of signage in the surrounding area, would appear as overly dominant and would not maintain or enhance the streetscape.”

Citizen Outdoor said the proposed commercial sign in the centre of the region’s retail district was an appropriate use of the space and met the planning requirements.

The media company argued there was a local government bias against advertising and signage applications.

The VCAT member Kerrie Birtwistle agreed, saying “sweeping prejudice against electronic and promotion signs in local policy is unhelpful”.

“I am satisfied the siting of the sign as proposed provides a positive relationship with the host building and will not adversely impact the amenity of the nearby heritage building,” she said.

The electronic sign will cover the upper level glazed facade of the building facing the busy Mitchell St intersection.

Ms Birtwistle imposed restrictions on the sign avoid overly “dazzling” and distracting commercials, including requirements the LEDs had to be dimmable, no ad could be displayed for less than 30 seconds, a ban on animations, and the transition had to be instantaneous.

Even the risk of hackers was considered in the tribunal, with an emergency shutdown to be triggered if an attack led to “ unauthorised display of visual images or any other display malfunction”.