Those who have visited the city recently may have noticed large digital advertising screens installed on new public payphones across Melbourne.

The City of Melbourne is concerned that the new, larger structures may impede pedestrians, disrupt the flow of footpath traffic and negatively impact a number of local retailers and businesses.

The new installations are nearly 50 per cent larger and, at 1678mm high and 970mm wide, the digital advertising billboards are nearly 60 per cent larger than previous signage screens.

The high-resolution 75” LCD screens are programmed to show up to four advertisements every minute, displaying 15 and 30-second commercial advertisements into the public realm.

Last year, Telstra indicated it was planning to triple the number of structures with electronic billboards - from 40 to 120 – throughout the Hoddle Grid.

We asked the community for their feedback on the new payphone structures and digital billboards displaying commercial advertising in September 2018 and received more than 300 submissions.

The City of Melbourne has now refused a further 81 applications by JCDecaux for planning permits to display commercial advertising on new super-sized public phone booths across central Melbourne.

For more information, see Council refuses permits for supersized advertising.

