Almost half of Prague billboards are at odds with current legislation, analysis shows

An analysis of how billboards in Prague comply with existing laws revealed that, out of a total of 1,531 billboards located in Prague, 684 were at odds with the current legislation.

The most frequent violations were related to the minimum distance between billboards. Compounding the problem is the lack of unified regulations across Prague districts, and variations in the distribution of billboards across the Czech capital. 

The analysis, which was created by Deputy Mayor Adam Scheinherr, in cooperation with the Technical management of communications, in charge of managing roads and other municipal property in the territory of Prague, ran into hurdles from the beginning. The reason was that not all of the 22 building authorities in Prague that oversee billboard management provided the needed information.

Kristýna Drápalová, who participated in the research, said that individual district show "huge differences in decision-making," resulting in occasional refusals to share data about the distribution of billboards. The local differences were also significant when it came to the actual data. For instance, while the district of Prague 6 had 11 billboards, the much smaller one of Prague 4 had 203.

Scheinherr said the legislation will allow the current municipal administration to pass a "clearly organized agenda" to its successors. Additionally, a law passed in 2021 prohibited new billboard land leases, and the renewal of existing contracts, which could be a good opportunity for a legislative review of advertising regulations.