Planning for Private Consumption and Collective Beauty

Abstract

Outdoor advertising proliferation and the development of land use regulations in Los Angeles illustrate the complicated nature of balancing the economic and physical aspects of urban development. Regulating outdoor advertising is part of a movement to control the spatial structure of the consumer economy and manage the appearance of the landscape through zoning. The efforts of planners to regulate outdoor advertising are frequently challenged legally or stalled by political indecision. The history of Los Angeles billboard regulation illuminates the financial demands for encouraging the spectacle of consumer landscapes as well as the persistent difficulty planners have had regulating urban appearance.