An AMNY article today reported that City Council speaker Christine Quinn has “floated the idea of selling advertising space on city-owned buildings and vehicles” to close the city’s budget deficit.
As is often the case when these ideas pop up, the various positions range from “It’s a necessary evil” to “I won’t notice” to “It’s the end of the city.”
However, the most interesting dichotomy to me was the potential placement for the ads. There seems to be no distinction between garbage trucks and the Brooklyn Bridge in terms of what could be a candidate for ad placement. Personally, I see much more potential for the former than the latter — people on the Brooklyn Bridge are oohing and aahing at the skyline, while people walking by a garbage truck have little elsewhere to look (and always turn their heads looking for the source of the smell). Plus, garbage truck ads could potentially be targeted by neighborhood — always a plus for advertisers.
