More Evidence City Hates Small Businesses

City Hall must be running out of ideas on how to drive mom-and-pop stores out of business and make things a little easier for their big-box, chain-retailer friends. Brooklyn Paper reported over the weekend that the government has started to crack down on sidewalk sandwich-board signs, those a-frame, folding jobbies that shops put out in front of their stores in hopes of attracting shoppers.

Now, come on. What lousy lunch or spousal argument led an idle bureaucrat to issue this pointless fiat? Has there been a rash of sandwich-board murders, with culprits offing citizens with hosted placards when guns and knives proved unavailable? Did Bloomberg trip over a "hot soup" sign and drop his gold-plated money clip down a manhole? How are these things harming anyone? The City argues that they obstruct the sidewalk, and has been handing out $100-$300 tickets. This is nonsense. Aside from impeding the progress of a holdup man trying desperately to make his getaway (which would be a good thing), I can't imagine how any of these signs has even gotten in anyone's way. Everyone out there who has every trucking down the sidewalk and found his path obstructed by a sandwich board, raise your hand.

I thought so.

I don't know about you, but when I look at old photos of Fourth Avenue or Essex Street or whatever shopping strip, the thing I love is the riot of small-scale signage running perpendicular to the street. Hanging signs jutting up above your head, visible from a block away, and sidewalk signs, usually hand-painted or hand-drawn. It adds an extra dimension to the urban landscape. So much more attractive and visually stimulating that the flat, one-dimensional sea of neon we get these days. It also provides small vendors with a no-cost way to advertise. After all, Rite Aid and Staples don't need sidewalk signs; they've got two-foot-tall, firetruck-red letters that scream what they are. But I guess there's no chance that a sign so big and garish as that might actually stop people in their tracks and obstruct traffic. No, no chance of that at all.