                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

POLICY; DEFINITIONS (§ 33.2-1200)

A. In order to promote the safety, convenience, and enjoyment of travel on and
protection of the public investment in highways within the Commonwealth, attract
tourists and promote the prosperity, economic well-being, and general welfare of
the Commonwealth, and preserve and enhance the natural scenic beauty or
aesthetic features of the highways and adjacent areas, the General Assembly
declares it to be the policy of the Commonwealth that the erection and
maintenance of outdoor advertising in areas adjacent to the rights-of-way of the
highways within the Commonwealth shall be regulated in accordance with the terms
of this article and regulations promulgated by the Board pursuant thereto.

B. As used in this article, unless the context requires a different meaning:
			&#8220;Advertisement&#8221; means any writing, printing, picture, painting,
display, emblem, drawing, sign, or similar device that is posted or displayed
outdoors on real property and is intended to invite or to draw the attention of
or solicit the patronage or support of the public to any goods, merchandise,
real or personal property, business, services, entertainment, or amusement
manufactured, produced, bought, sold, conducted, furnished, or dealt in by any
person. &#8220;Advertisement&#8221; includes any part of an advertisement
recognizable as such.
			&#8220;Advertising structure&#8221; means any rigid or semirigid material,
with or without any advertisement displayed thereon, situated upon or attached
to real property outdoors, primarily or principally for the purpose of
furnishing a background or base or support upon which an advertisement may be
posted or displayed.
			&#8220;Area of an advertising structure&#8221; means the area determined from
its outside measurements, excluding as a part thereof the height and overall
width of supports and supporting structure and any other portion or portions
thereof beneath the normal area upon which an advertisement is posted or
intended to be posted.
			&#8220;Billboard sign&#8221; means any sign, advertisement, or advertising
structure as defined in this section owned by a person, firm, or corporation in
the business of outdoor advertising.
			&#8220;Business of outdoor advertising&#8221; means the erection, use, or
maintenance of advertising structures or the posting or display of outdoor
advertisements by any person who receives profit gained from rentals or any
other compensation from any other person for the use or maintenance of such
advertising structures or the posting or display of such advertisements, except
reasonable compensation for materials and labor used or furnished in the actual
erection of advertising structures or the actual posting of advertisements.
&#8220;Business of outdoor advertising&#8221; does not include the leasing or
rental of advertising structures or advertisements used to advertise products,
services, or entertainment sold or provided on the premises where the
advertising structures or advertisement is located.
			&#8220;Centerline of the highway&#8221; means a line equidistant from the
edges of the median separating the main traveled ways of a divided highway or
the centerline of the main traveled way of a nondivided highway.
			&#8220;Distance from edge of a right-of-way&#8221; means the horizontal
distance measured along a line normal or perpendicular to the centerline of the
highway.
			&#8220;Federal-aid primary highway&#8221; means any highway within that
portion of the primary state highway system as established and maintained under
Article 2 (&#xA7; 33.2-310 et seq.) of Chapter 3, including extensions of such
system within municipalities, that has been approved by the Secretary of
Transportation pursuant to 23 U.S.C. &#xA7; 103(b), as that system existed on
June 1, 1991.
			&#8220;Highway&#8221; means every way or place of whatever nature open to the
use of the public for purposes of vehicular travel in the Commonwealth.
			&#8220;Historic place, museum, or shrine&#8221; includes only places that are
maintained wholly at public expense or by a nonprofit organization.
			&#8220;Information center&#8221; means an area or site established and
maintained at rest areas for the purpose of informing the public of places of
interest within the Commonwealth and providing such other information as the
Commonwealth may consider desirable.
			&#8220;Interchange&#8221; means a grade separated intersection with one or
more turning roadways for travel between intersection legs, or an intersection
at grade, where two or more highways join or cross.
			&#8220;Lawfully erected&#8221; means any sign that was erected pursuant to
the issuance of a permit from the Commissioner of Highways under &#xA7;
33.2-1208, unless the local governing body has evidence of noncompliance with
ordinances in effect at the time the sign was erected.
			&#8220;Legible&#8221; means capable of being read without visual aid by a
person of normal visual acuity.
			&#8220;Maintain&#8221; means to allow to exist.
			&#8220;Main traveled way&#8221; means the traveled way of a highway on which
through traffic is carried. In the case of a divided highway, the traveled way
of each of the separated roadways for traffic in opposite directions is a main
traveled way. &#8220;Main traveled way&#8221; does not include such facilities
as frontage roads, turning roadways, or parking areas.
			&#8220;National Highway System&#8221; means the federal-aid highway system
referenced in 23 U.S.C. &#xA7; 103(b), and regulations adopted pursuant thereto.
For the purpose of this article, outdoor advertising controls on the National
Highway System shall be implemented as those highways are designated and
approved by congressional action or designation by the U.S. Secretary of
Transportation and such designation and approval shall be kept on file in the
central office of the Department of Transportation and placed in the minutes of
the Commonwealth Transportation Board by the Commissioner of Highways. Prior to
congressional approval or designation by the U.S. Secretary of Transportation,
highways classified as National System of Interstate and Defense Highways,
Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways,
Interstate System, or federal-aid primary highway as defined in this section
shall be considered as the National Highway System.
			&#8220;Nonconforming sign,&#8221; &#8220;nonconforming advertisement,&#8221;
or &#8220;nonconforming advertising structure&#8221; means one that was lawfully
erected adjacent to any highway in the Commonwealth but that does not comply
with the provisions of state law, state regulations, or ordinances adopted by
local governing bodies passed at a later date or that later fails to comply with
state law, state regulations, or ordinances adopted by local governing bodies
due to changed conditions.
			&#8220;Person&#8221; includes an individual, partnership, association, or
corporation.
			&#8220;Post&#8221; means post, display, print, paint, burn, nail, paste, or
otherwise attach.
			&#8220;Real property&#8221; includes any property physically attached or
annexed to real property in any manner whatsoever.
			&#8220;Rest area&#8221; means an area or site established and maintained
within or adjacent to the right-of-way or under public supervision or control
for the convenience of the traveling public.
			&#8220;Scenic area&#8221; means any public park or area of particular scenic
beauty or historical significance designated as a scenic area by the Board.
			&#8220;Sign&#8221; means any outdoor sign, display, device, figure, painting,
drawing, message, placard, poster, billboard, or other thing that is designed,
intended, or used to advertise or inform, any part of the advertising or
informative contents of which is visible from any highway.
			&#8220;Trade name&#8221; includes a brand name, trademark, distinctive
symbol, or other similar device or thing used to identify particular products or
services.
			&#8220;Traveled way&#8221; means the portion of a roadway for the movement of
vehicles, exclusive of shoulders.
			&#8220;Turning roadway&#8221; means a connecting roadway for traffic turning
between two intersection legs of an interchange.
			&#8220;Urban area&#8221; means an urbanized area or, in the case of an
urbanized area encompassing more than one state, that part of the urbanized area
within the Commonwealth, or an urban place.
			&#8220;Urbanized area&#8221; means an area so designated by the U.S. Census
Bureau, within boundaries fixed by the Commissioner of Highways, in his
discretion, in cooperation with the governing bodies of the localities affected
and the appropriate federal authority. Such boundaries shall, at a minimum,
encompass the entire urbanized area within a state as designated by the U.S.
Census Bureau.
			&#8220;Urban place&#8221; means an area so designated by the U.S. Census
Bureau having a population of 5,000 or more and not within any urbanized area,
within boundaries fixed by the Commissioner of Highways, in his discretion, in
cooperation with the governing bodies of the localities affected and the
appropriate federal authority. Such boundaries shall, at a minimum, encompass
the entire urban place designated by the U.S. Census Bureau.
			&#8220;Virginia byway&#8221; and &#8220;scenic highway&#8221; means those
highways designated by the Board pursuant to &#xA7; 33.2-405. For the purposes
of this article, a Virginia byway means a scenic byway as referenced in 23
U.S.C. &#xA7; 131(s).
			&#8220;Visible&#8221; means capable of being seen (whether or not legible)
without visual aid by a person of normal visual acuity.

HISTORY: Code 1950, §§ 33-298, 33-310; 1954, c. 588; 1960, c. 406; 1962, c.
176; 1966, c. 663; 1970, c. 322, §§ 33.1-351, 33.1-363; 1976, c. 14; 1980, c.
275; 1984, c. 750; 1993, c. 538; 1996, c. 777; 2000, cc. 432, 449; 2002, c. 672;
2012, c. 145; 2013, c. 127; 2014, c. 805.