The engineers of the City District Government Karachi (CDGK) have adopted a new policy on billboards and signboard to prevent occurrence of any calamity during monsoon season. The CDGK Local Taxes (LT) District Officer (DO) Muhammad Rehan Khan had on May 30, 2008 chaired a meeting with outdoor advertisers and served a notice regarding safety measures to be applied on high-rise billboards and signboard.
However, no further meetings were held to review the safety measures. The CDGK (LT) has directed all the stakeholders ensure to make holes in iron sheets of panels of billboards to allow the gusty winds pass through so that the high-rise heavy billboards and hoarding could be prevented from a knockdown. However, no such directives have been issued to stakeholders doing business within the limits of cantonment boards. The advertisers have also been directed to place thermopile to cover the holes and in case the winds blows rough, these thermopile covers would burst into pieces rather than causing the whole steel structure to bow down and cause lethal damages to the people in the vicinity.
The CDGK had announced last year that rooftop installation of billboards and signboards would not be allowed after heavy human casualties had happened when dozens of billboards had fallen over passers-by during last monsoon. However, installation of rooftop billboards is still there in city. The Faisal cantonment board has also initiated permission for the rooftop installation of heavy billboards and signboards.
The electric supply to billboards in CDGK and cantonment areas has been banned in pursuance to the Water and Power Development Authority to minimise the load-shedding in city. Technical experts on billboards and signboards said that the CDGK engineers have not studied the aerodynamics and have calculated a wrong policy at a wrong time. It is not the only monsoon season when the gusty winds could be expected but the escalating global warming around the world especially in sub-continent could provoke sea or wind storm any time. The thermopile covering would not be strong enough to repulse the wind pressure and thus the iron sheets would lose the welded joints from the main panel and would cause more damages if dropped.
A CDGK EDO said that making holes into the front iron sheets was not a proper solution because the wind never passes away in a right direct direction but it swirls like a whirlpool during the passage. These holes could be unsafe and would create more problems.
"Nowadays, corporate sector has adopted a new trend of outdoor advertising as they have started mobile advertising that patrols on streets. This is quite safe and should be encouraged and promoted," suggested the EDO. The CDGK had set a revenue target worth Rs 20 million in 2002, which has escalated now to Rs 60 million. City nazim has cut the number of billboards from 5,000 to 1800 causing a loss to revenue so government should allow CDGK to control and manage the billboard industry alone and the matters pertaining to revenue should be settled at offices, commented Durrani.