Signs and the sign industry represent an important part of the public communication and identification system within the Troy community. Also, advertising by means of signs is recognized as a legitimate part of business enterprise. Of equal importance is accomplishing this communication, identification, and advertising in a manner that will not detract from existing business and residential investment and in a manner consistent with local values of community appearance and traffic and pedestrian safety. The City of Troy has historically evidenced a concern in keeping the City beautiful. Uncontrolled use of signs can lead to visual clutter, thus reducing the effectiveness of the individual messages and, in some cases, rendering individual signs useless. Thus, there is a public benefit, a public value, and an element of the public safety in controlling the location, type, and size of signs within the City. The sign regulations of this Sign Code are intended to take into consideration the community appearance as well as safety effects of signs upon the environment in which they are located. This regulation also intends to protect and safeguard the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.
(a) Findings.
(1) City Council members recognize that signs not only serve commercial purposes but that they offer an easy method for providing site-specific information and an inexpensive way for people to express their opinions on matters of public interest and their support for particular causes or events. For that reason, City Council members find that it is both necessary and appropriate to provide more liberally for noncommercial signs than for commercial ones, but that noncommercial signs, like commercial ones, should be subject to significant limitations in size and height.
(2) The current Troy Zoning Ordinance was approved on January 1, 2000, after considerable public discussion, which included a sign code.
(3) Throughout the time that the City has administered and maintained a sign ordinance, signs espousing political candidates and causes and expressing individual opinions on matters of public policy have appeared throughout the community with no record of municipal interference with such signs based on their content and with no litigation over the use of signs to express personal opinions.
(4) Sign regulation in Troy is part of a comprehensive program of planning and zoning controls.
(5) Safety of traffic and pedestrians is also an important consideration to the City Council of Troy in amending its sign ordinance.
(6) Based on evidence and based on their personal observations as drivers and passengers, the City Council finds that there is evidence that billboards and other signs distract drivers for at least brief periods of time from their driving tasks and that such distraction may have an effect on traffic safety.
(7) Although the evidence regarding traffic safety is mixed, City Council members are well aware that the intent of billboard advertisers is to attract the attention of drivers, thus distracting them from their driving task and creating an increased risk of accidents.
(8) The City Council finds that there is a relationship between traffic safety and the regulation of signs and a particular relationship between traffic safety and large signs such as billboards.
(9) Main Street in Troy is also Ohio State Route 41, which carries in excess of ten thousand vehicles through the heart of the City.
(10) Market Street in Troy is also Ohio State Route 55, which carries in excess of ten thousand vehicles through the heart of the City.
(11) Because much of the traffic on S.R. 41 and S.R. 55 exits from I-75 in Troy, vehicles are often used to traveling at relatively high rates of speed, creating a potentially dangerous situation for pedestrians in the downtown area.
(12) A major north-south arterial in Troy is County Road 25A, which also functions as a secondary road for I-75, carrying tens of thousands of vehicles per day on Main Street and Market Street.
(13) Although there is less pedestrian activity along County Road 25A than along main thoroughfares, there are many intersections with local and collector streets, creating a more complex driving environment than is found on frontage roads.
(14) Troy has other exits from I-75 which draw traffic from and feeds traffic to County Road 25A.
(15) Commercial and light industrial activity focused around I-75, County Road 25A, major thoroughfares and the two Interstate 75 exits create a significant demand for commercial advertising, a demand that the City must balance with its goal of maintaining local traffic conditions that are safe for drivers and pedestrians alike.
(16) For all of these reasons, the City Council finds that it is both necessary and appropriate as part of its overall zoning and sign provisions and other code provisions designed to preserve and protect the public health, safety and welfare in the physical development of the community to adopt a Sign Code.
(17) City Council and the Planning Commission held public meetings to review the draft to the Sign Code.
(Ord. 7-2009. Passed 2-2-09.)