Digital Advertising Guidelines Supported by TAC

Monday, January 19, 2015

A completed pooled fund project to develop guidelines for digital and projected advertising displays has received support from the Transportation Association of Canada’s (TAC) Chief Engineers’ Council.

A notice will be posted on TAC’s website in the coming months once the publication and accompanying documents are available for sale in TAC’s Bookstore.

Rapid changes to digital advertising billboards, and associated reductions in costs of these devices, have greatly increased requests for installations of these devices near roadways. With the increase in light intensity, resolution, animation functions and size of these devices, road authorities across Canada are challenged with establishing guidelines for the installation of this rapidly-changing technology.

Without appropriate guidelines, devices can be installed without understanding potential negative impacts on road users. This has resulted in growing concerns from road authorities and others about distracted driving and other potential safety issues.

Developed under the auspices of both TAC’s Road Safety Standing Committee and Traffic Operations and Management Standing Committee, the guidelines are intended to assist jurisdictions in setting their own regulations concerning digital and projected advertising displays (DPADs), evaluating DPAD permit applications, and assessing the potential road safety impact of DPADs. They provide recommendations that are designed to control DPADs such that they emulate static advertising signs and therefore result in a similar distracting and road safety effect as static advertisements.

The publication will include:

  • a review of literature and current practices, safety impacts and research studies from Canadian, American and international perspective
  • a review of the latest regulations / guidelines being utilized by various jurisdictions
  • a comprehensive synthesis of practices and assessment guideline 
  • a review and summary of the latest research of safety impacts of digital and projected advertising displays applied near roadways

MORR Transportation Consulting conducted the work for this project. Guidelines are supported by a knowledge-based document and an environmental scan report.

Funding partners for this project included British Columbia Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure; Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation; Ontario Ministry of Transportation; Ministère des Transports du Québec; Saskatchewan Highways and Infrastructure; Halifax Regional Municipality and the cities of Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Montréal, Saskatoon and Toronto.  

 

 

 


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