Billboards to be Removed

Clear Channel Outdoor Inc., one of the largest outdoor advertising companies in Houston soon will begin removing more than 800 of its small and mid-size billboards across the city, officials said Monday.

The agreement to remove about two-thirds of Clear Channel's 1,347 small and medium-sized billboards from private property is expected to end two decades of litigation with the city and speed the elimination of signs that were slated to come down in 2013 anyway, company and city officials said.

City officials estimate there are about 4,000 billboards in Houston and just outside its boundaries. Removing them has been a hotly contested battled since the city adopted an ordinance to regulate them in 1980. |Read on|