Murrysville council will ask its planning commission to revisit its signage ordinance to potentially address newer signs using LED lighting.
“There are a lot of LED signs popping up and I don’t know if we really address those,” council President Dayne Dice said.
Murrysville’s existing ordinance lays out a host of parameters for the size, shape and manner of display for signs based on their zoning and location, but does not address LED signage specifically.
“I’m sensitive to a few signs that exist right now, and they are blindingly bright early in the morning and late at night, and that’s right on (Route) 22,” Councilman Loren Kase said. “I mean, if we get ten more of those in the next year, it’s Las Vegas.”
Dice agreed.
“I think something else Loren mentioned that’s telling, is that you can tell when you go from Monroeville into Murrysville, so I think that’s something worth exploring,” he said.
Murrysville Chief Administrator Jim Morrison said he would ask the planning commission to add signage to its agenda, in order to make a recommendation for council.
As part of a 2016 research paper, the International Sign Association recommends dimming the brightness on LED signs either manually, or on a timer or using photocell technology, so that the extreme brightness required to make a sign visible in sunlight doesn’t also make it unreasonably bright after dark.
It also recommends that electronic messaging signs “not exceed 0.3 foot-candles over ambient lighting conditions” when measured at a distance which changes on a sliding scale based on a sign’s size. A 10-square-foot sign would be measured at 32 feet, a 20-square-foot sign at 45 feet, and so on.
“It is in the best interest of all stakeholders to ensure that (electronic signs) are sufficiently bright to ensure clear legibility, while at the same time avoiding a display that is overly bright,” ISA researchers wrote in the paper.
