State officials pulled down billboard-size ads at Honolulu International Airport and city officials ordered removal of such ads in municipal parking garages in the aftermath of a complaint from the Outdoor Circle. The group said the signs violated the state's ban on billboards and were part of a growing trend to skirt the law.

State Transportation Department spokesman Scott Ishikawa said three signs posted along the freeway supports across from the interisland baggage claim were removed, as was another sign leading into a parking garage that could be seen from the roadway.

The Outdoor Circle — longtime champion of the state's ban on billboards — praised the state and city moves but said people need to remain vigilant against the proliferation of such advertising. "These things are growing like a cancer on our city," said Bob Loy, Outdoor Circle director of environmental programs.

The Advertiser reported in November on what Loy called "billboard creep," a growing trend toward display ads that looked a lot like billboards, first in privately owned parking garages and then peeking out from the structures into the open.

Ishikawa said the four signs that were pulled down were moved to other locations in the parking garage, so there was no loss of revenue. In fiscal year 2005, Ishikawa said, the airport received $16,240 from the garage advertising to help offset airport operating costs.

He said no new signs will go up where those were removed, but that the signs inside the parking garages will remain.

City enterprise services director Sidney Quintal said officials wrote to AdWalls — the private company placing the ads under contract with the city — on Jan. 10 and asked the company to remove signs from all but three parking garages.

Quintal wrote that the city had first listed 11 areas for such advertising but is withdrawing eight sites "and will only allow advertising displays at the Neal S. Blaisdell Center, Ali'i Place and Harbor Court parking garages."

He added, "advertising displays will not be allowed at any other municipal parking garages."

Quintal said the action comes from city interpretation of the Land Use Ordinance that does not allow signs at any public municipal parking garage. "We had a meeting and we did look at our interpretation," Quintal said. "In some areas, it's inappropriate."

Officials from AdWalls, which describes itself as "America's Indoor Billboard Company," did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.

Loy said his organization hears from people who oppose the signs. "We continue to get a steady stream of complaints from the public about people who don't want to see billboards in Hawai'i," he said. "I think we are fighting a very powerful opponent on this. I don't see us as losing the battle but we're not winning it as well."

Loy still hopes for a definitive decision about whether such advertisements are legal on public property at all.

But he said it's important to question such displays. "They go up, and people sort of become oblivious to them after a while because they're just more clutter on the visual landscape."

Loy said the Outdoor Circle will keep after government agencies and private companies that allow such signs. "We're never going to give up," he said.

Reach Robbie Dingeman at rdingeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.