Kathmandu, March 27

Dust. Potholes. Polluted rivers. Unmanaged settlements. Cables and wires dangling from electricity poles. These have turned Kathmandu, Nepal’s federal capital, into a dirty city. Add to that the soaring number of hoarding and flex boards and the city becomes an eyesore.

Most of the commercial and public places of Kathmandu are now filled with hoarding and flex boards. They can be seen on rooftops, verandas, sides of buildings, utility poles, open grounds and almost everywhere. They are apparently popping up using a loophole in the law, deteriorating the landscape and skyline of the city and jeopardising safety of pedestrians and other road users. Nowadays, hoarding boards can also be seen on walls, which can collapse due to the weight of heavy advertisement materials during disasters like earthquakes, causing injuries and fatalities. But the authority concerned is doing precious little.

Kathmandu Metropolitan City’s Advertising Board Promotional Material Regulation Policy 2013 clearly states it is illegal to put up commercial hoarding boards and advertisement materials on additional frames on rooftops and verandas of private and public houses. The policy has also barred placement of such materials in public places and on utility poles and roadsides.

The policy was introduced after hoarding boards started sprouting on every rooftop and veranda, destroying aesthetics of the metropolitan city and raising safety issues. “Although these advertisement materials are a good revenue source for the metropolitan city, their negative effects on urban development, public safety and environment should also be taken into account,” states the preamble of the policy, which was introduced when Baburam Bhattarai was the country’s prime minister.

The policy, introduced with the noble intention of beautifying the city, however, has a loophole. It states that hoarding boards of over 200 sq ft could be placed upon conducting a safety audit from technicians certified by the Nepal Engineering Council. Based on this provision, advertisers have been putting up hoarding and flex boards of every size almost everywhere in the city.

“Most of the hoarding boards have been placed without conducting a safety audit. And many have not even paid the fees,” said KMC’s Revenue Department Head Noor Nidhi Neupane. This is violation of standards created by the metropolitan city, according to Hari Kunwar, head of KMC’s Urban Good Governance Department.

KMC’s record shows that advertisers have duly obtained permission to put up only around 100 hoarding boards of over 200 sq ft. But a drive through the city reveals there are lot more hoarding boards of that size than those registered at the metropolitan city’s office.

“We’ll soon start removing all the hoarding and flex boards that have been placed without taking permission from us,” said Neupane. “We are also planning to replace all hoarding boards with light emitting sign boards from the next fiscal year as per the decision taken by the metropolitan city in December 2018.”

The Advertisement (Regulation) Bill, which is currently in the Parliament, has also proposed to prohibit the display of hoarding boards on electricity and telephone poles.

“Haphazard placement of sign and hoarding boards causes visual pollution. This causes stress. This has been proved by scientists around the world,” said Ashok Maharjan, an urban environmentalist. He urged the metropolitan city to “make the city beautiful and safe rather than focus solely on revenue”.

Potential hazards

• Jeopardising safety of pedestrians and other road users
• Walls supporting hoarding boards are more likely to fall causing injuries and even fatalities
• Causing visual pollution, which in turn causes stress