More than 30 years after outlawing big flashing signs in all but the seediest areas of the city, Boston wants to bring back some glitz to parts of town deemed too dark and staid at night.
Saying it wants colorful electronic marquees to create an atmosphere like Times Square in New York, the Boston Redevelopment Authority is planning to amend the city’s zoning code to permit electronic signs that make “bold use of graphics” and create a sense of “animation and motion” and “images that engage the public.”
The new rules would apply in the Theater District, the South Boston waterfront near the convention center, and Lansdowne Street near Fenway Park, areas that draw tourists and are considered ripe for nightlife development.
“It will enliven those areas, make it more interesting and unique, in the same way as when you’re in New York City and you go to Times Square,” said Kairos Shen, the BRA’s director of planning, who is heading the effort. “It will help bring our Theater District to the 21st century, in terms of image.”
Boston banned flashing signs in the 1970s amid agressive urban renewal efforts including the razing of Scollay Square to create Government Center. The city allowed the signs only in a small area near Chinatown described in the zoning code as “an adult entertainment district.” Everywhere else, commercial signs were required to be static and emit only “continuous light.”
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But city officials, including Mayor Thomas M. Menino, began to feel that some districts needed a lift and could benefit from the color and action of more lively signs, especially from the electronic billboards that use thousands of tiny lights to create pictures and moving images. At the same time, businesses in Boston have been pressing the city for permission to install more visually impressive signs, and officials decided to capitalize on the wave of interest.
“We’re trying to be ahead of this new, exploding technology,” Shen said.
City planners said they are allowing the signs in areas seen as up-and-coming entertainment districts, like the blocks around the South Boston convention center, where nightlife has not caught up with the spate of new hotels and other development, and near Fenway Park, where the city, state, and the Boston Red Sox have been laying plans for transportation and neighborhood improvements to bring the zone to a new level.
While relaxing the code in those areas, the city is maintaining its sign restriction in other parts of the city, updating the zoning code to specifically ban the new electronic signs outside the three designated zones.
The BRA is scheduled to hold a hearing on the issue tonight. To become part of the zoning code, changes must be approved by the city’s zoning commission. If the changes are adopted, they would enable businesses to mount screens on the facades of their buildings, where they could be lighted from 7 a.m. to 2 a.m.
The changes include 20 design guidelines that aim to keep the signs in character with the districts where they’re installed, and the city would have the right to order signs removed if the BRA finds them offensive or distracting to drivers or pedestrians. The city also would restrict the amount of commercial advertising that sign owners could run on the signs and would require that 10 percent of the programming contain public service announcements, such as the weather, news, or time of day.
“We can’t do this willy-nilly,” Shen said.
Many businesses in the Theater District currently have painted signs or small neon signs in their windows. The city has recently granted permission for some electronic signs in the Theater District; the Cutler Majestic Theater, for example, got permission to install an electronic sign that changes every few seconds and displays text in red, purple, and turquoise.
Typical theater signs have marquees that require block letters to be installed by hand. Owners complain that those are costly and don’t allow for promotion of upcoming shows.
“It would liven things up,” said Josiah A. Spaulding Jr., president of the Citi Performing Arts Center, which controls the Wang and Shubert theaters. “It would cost less money [than changing the marquee]. You’d be able to do more messaging, you’d be able to promote more shows at the same time, and you’d liven up the Theater District.”
He said it costs the Shubert several hundred dollars to change the marquee because the work requires a truck, a city permit, and a police detail.
The city is also planning a new building at the corner of Tremont and Stuart streets that will act as a gateway to the Theater District. Plans call for a 12-story, curvy, glass building whose focus will be a large electronic video display facing the streets.
But citing traffic and neighborhood concerns, the BRA rejected a proposal from TD Banknorth Garden last year to erect a giant video billboard on its building facing Interstate 93.
Residents interviewed yesterday agreed that allowing flashier signs would, in the words of one, add “a little Boston bling.” But they were dubious that the new signs would have much impact.
“Would I be more likely to go to the theater? No,” said Sidra Vitale, 36, who passes through the area every day on her way to New England School of Law. “I’m not going because of the sign.”
“Just change a few signs?” scoffed Astrid Claessens, a 22-year-old Boston resident. “I don’t see how that will change the area.”
