Dallas is not exactly known as a paradise for pedestrians.

Sidewalks often consist of narrow strips of concrete that are often broken and interrupted.

Why, then, is City Hall still determined to pursue a plan to sell some of the few public rights of way we have to advertisers?

Today the city is holding another public meeting on the topic of “digital kiosks,” which city officials seem to want to force on us, even though the heads of the major business associations in the downtown and surrounding areas have made it clear that they do not want them.

And they don’t want them for good reason. Despite the supposed benefits (cards and WiFi that people have phones for), these are really just a revenue-generating ploy for City Hall. The products being sold are your attention and your public space.

We do not have enough of these two assets to allow the city to trade them.

Dallas City Hall has an annoying habit of entering into contracts with advertisers that benefit not the public but the profiteering corporations.

Because of the city’s digital billboard deals with outdoor advertising companies, we are now inundated with billboards that should have been there long ago according to city ordinance.

And all over the city, there are cylindrical analog kiosks that contain a few ads but mostly serve as in-house advertising for City Hall itself. These barrel-shaped obstacles often take up what little sidewalk space there is, and they present a visual barrier for motorists.

The city told residents that the focus of this latest public meeting will be “on kiosks within public rights-of-way” and that it will be “the start of a new initiative to explore kiosks and their impact on the built environment.”

This has been sold as a “reboot” of the kiosk program, with the possibility of certain areas “opting in.” We want to caution against this and urge residents to make it clear that these kiosks are not a good fit for Dallas.

It is cynical to clutter our limited public space with unnecessary and obstructive decoration under the pretext that this is a public service.

We hope that residents of Uptown, Downtown, Deep Ellum and beyond will attend this public meeting, whether in person at City Hall or virtually, and make it clear that Dallas wants to improve public spaces by expanding sidewalks, creating bike lanes, planting trees and generally making our city more attractive and livable.

What we don’t want is to sell our city to the highest bidder.

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