Are we headed for the end of digital and light advertising in our cities? The former Minister of Ecology and MP for Deux-Sèvres (Generation Ecology), Delphine Batho, tabled this Wednesday, February 5, a bill to that effect.
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Concretely, it wishes to ban advertising screens in public space, in particular those in which advertising videos follow one another all day long. " The objective is to put an end to this aberration which leads to unnecessary energy consumption in these times marked by climate change, but it is also linked to a public health imperative ," she said in Le Figaro . “ Studies have followed one after the other to prove that children under the age of 6 should not be exposed to screens, but there they install billboards everywhere in public space. However, we cannot control the age of the people who see these screens every day , ”she insists.
This ban would concern, if the text is voted, all public roads, as well as airports, stations and public transport. The screens placed in the windows will also be targeted. " In Paris, already 704 digital screens have been installed in the metro and 686 in large stations ", specifies Delphine Batho, affirming that a thousand digital screens are present in the shop windows. " Especially since a 2m² digital panel consumes 7000 KWH per year, or the annual consumption of a household with children ", according to the text we were able to consult. This prohibition would not however apply to devices intended exclusively for information of general interest of a national or local nature.
" Advertising is everywhere around us "
The member for Deux-Sèvres regrets that mayors do not have the power to ban these digital signs, especially in stations where this prerogative belongs to the SNCF. But this problem is not only present in Paris. In cities like Lyon, Toulouse and Lille, collectives have formed to denounce light and interactive advertising. “ Not to mention the quality of the urban landscape. We are heading towards a ugly and uniform world where advertising is everywhere around us ”, storms the ex-minister.
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Faced with recent attacks on digital billboards, the French company specializing in urban advertising, JCDecaux, had defended its action. " These signs are already better than sending someone with a car to change the poster, " explained Jean-François Decaux, director of the company, on Franceinfo in March 2019.
The bill, which must be supported by part of the presidential majority to be voted, will be placed on the office of the President of the National Assembly next week.
