'A Little Las Vegas': West Hollywood Residents Say New Digital Billboard On Sunset Strip Lights Up Their Homes Around The Clock
WEST HOLLYWOOD (CBSLA) — A new digital billboard is now lighting up the Sunset Strip, but residents living nearby say is lighting up their apartments and is way too bright.
The massive silver-paneled digital billboard, named the West Hollywood Sunset Spectacular, is the newest addition along Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. The screens turned on a few weeks ago after years of planning.
"When they turned it on all the lights went into my living room, my dining room and kitchen window and the images and colors go on my wall every night," said West Hollywood resident Jerome Cleary.
Cleary took videos of the new billboard at night. He lives a block and a half away, just north of the Sunset Strip and didn't think he would be impacted by the new sign.
"I have the lights coming in red," he said. "I didn't expect to be living like this and have light pollution like this."
Yegi Hedayat lives directly across from the billboard in the Shoreham Villas and says the flashing lights go on through the night.
"I just noticed the lights keep on blinking," Hedayat said. "When I'm in my kitchen washing the dishes I noticed it's on."
Neighbors say they would like to see the sign turned off — at least for a few hours.
The owners of the digital billboard —Orange Barrel Media — say they've listened to these concerns from the very beginning of the project and continue to make adjustments.
"Since that time, we've been operating much dimmer, well under the guidelines that were established in our contract," said Orange Barrel Media CEO Pete Scantland. "We are absolutely committed to working with residents trying to get it right."
West Hollywood City Councilman John D'Amico says the sign is part of a seven-year plan of reinventing the billboard culture along Sunset Blvd. There are currently designs for 20 other digital billboards that will be added.
"It's going to be like a little Las Vegas here," Hedayat said.
The Sunset Spectacular billboard will also display work from local artists and messages from non-profits.
"(It) sets a new ambition for what a sign can be in the 21st-century," Scantland said.
Cleary says he pays a lot of money for his view and hopes he doesn't have to give it up.
"I don't want to live like a prisoner with everything blocked out," Cleary said.
D'Amico said each of these signs will bring in up to $500,000 a year for the city and that they go through a strict and lengthy approval process.
