Abu Dhabi, 12 Jan 2016:
The Abu Dhabi City Municipality has staged a comprehensive campaign to combat rampant outlawed signboards clustering streets and roundabouts of Al Wathba, which were installed without securing permits from competent authorities. The practice resulted in distorting the general appearance and posing threat to the safety of roads and R/As of Al Wathba and surrounding areas.
This campaign reflects the attention of the municipal system and its commitment to protect the civilized appearance of cities and suburbs from all types of distorting elements. It also underlines the importance of adhering to laws and regulations governing the use of public facilities, streets and roundabouts along with the need to obtain approvals and official permits from the concerned authorities.
The Abu Dhabi City Municipality calls upon all community members to contribute to realizing these objectives, and refrain from installing signboards in public places as the they pose risk to traffic safety and contribute to disfiguring the general outlook of streets, roundabouts, facilities and infrastructure.
The Municipality confirmed that inspection and monitoring teams had spotted this phenomenon in Al Wathba area where signboards were randomly installed on roads, roundabouts and official directional sign posts. Such random and disfiguring elements caused by installing signboards without obtaining official license from the Municipality and its strategic partners had led the Municipality to run such campaign to monitor and stamp out this phenomenon. Here 4 warnings were served to offenders, in a bid to safeguard the civilized appearance of the city.
The Municipality reminded all community members of the importance of adhering to signboards installation guidelines and obtaining the required permits beforehand to avoid offences. This reflects the Municipality’s keen attention to foster partnership and cooperative ties with the community to protect public facilities and modern appearance of cities; besides calling upon the ads owners to remove in them as soon as the official license expires.
According to the Municipality, 78 billboards and directional signs were removed during campaign covering Al Wathba and the surrounding areas in cooperation with the Center of Waste Management. The campaign is still underway and will continue until all unlicensed ads and signboards are removed.
The Municipality offers the service of signboards installation permits through customer service centers as per the applicable laws in Abu Dhabi and line with roads user and sidewalk safety standards. This would preserve the landscape and harmony of public utilities including streets, roundabouts, and lampposts, among other service facilities.
The Municipality reminds owners of the importance of taking several key steps after obtaining the signboards installation to avoid offences such as sending a copy of the signboard installation permit and signboard site to the relevant municipal center, besides quoting the permit issuance and expiry date which must also be written on the signboard to be erected. The civic body also highlighted the importance of using high quality signboards in conformity with applicable standards, media identity, and the cultural nature of streets and cities.