Language Violations and Dangerous Billboards: How Mykolaiv Fights Against Advertising

The city authorities of Mykolaiv have set a goal to significantly reduce the number of advertising structures in the city to 350-400 units.

This was announced by chief architect Yevhen Polyakov during a briefing.

According to him, this reduction will reduce the number of available advertising spaces, but at the same time increase their cost. This may encourage businesses to reformat and provide better advertising. Poliakov also emphasized that all structures installed more than 15 years ago should be dismantled in the city, as they are dangerous - often rusty or wooden boards that pose a threat to pedestrians in bad weather.

The city's chief architect also said that Mykolaiv continues to record cases of signs in Russian, despite the current ban, even in 2025.

"Complaints are received through various channels - the government hotline, email, Facebook, and the city contact center. According to the official, the contact center received two new complaints about signs with Russian-language advertising only in the morning of his speech. The violations are being checked, and if confirmed, decisions are made to dismantle such signs if they have not been approved in accordance with the established procedure," he explained.

Mykolaiv has strict requirements for outdoor advertising, which differ significantly from the approaches of other Ukrainian cities. According to Polyakov, 95% of Mykolaiv's territory is currently closed for the installation of advertising structures unless a comprehensive advertising scheme is approved for the respective street.

"Previously, such schemes were developed at the expense of the city budget, but now the city takes a principled position: advertising is only allowed within the approved scheme, in compliance with fire breaks and safety requirements, in particular, at a distance from trolleybus contact networks and residential buildings. As a result of this approach, the number of permissible structures on one street can be reduced tenfold - for example, instead of 100, only 10 will remain," he said.

According to the new conditions, it is planned to approve a scheme on Tsentralnyi Avenue that will not allow the installation of billboards at all. Only modern video screens in the format of citylights will be allowed, with the complete removal of outdated solutions.

Ірина Глухова