City of Kelowna demands removal of mechanical mannequins from side of road

Two familiar faces that usually greet motorists as they drive down Kelowna’s Harvey Avenue are no longer allowed on the street.

Patty and Penny, who are both mechanical mannequins, have been pulled from the curb near the highway after the city warned Premium Oil Change business owner Doug Wood that they were breaking the sign bylaw.

In a letter, the city wrote that signs that move or have electrical pulsation are prohibited.

“They gave me 14 days to remove Penny and Patty from the highway, from our side of the sidewalk,” Wood said.

The business owner said he was disappointed by the decision about the mannequins.

“We dress them up,” he said. “At Christmas time, it’s Mrs. Santa Claus, at Halloween, we have a mask on them. And tourists will stop and take pictures with them.”

Wood said he was only told to get his girls off the street after somebody complained to the city.

The bylaw department said it doesn’t generally investigate until there is a complaint.

It does act on every file, and in cases like this, it will send a warning letter before ticketing if there is a violation, bylaw services manager Dave Gazley said.

Wood is upset that one complaint is enough for his mannequins to be pulled in, while other businesses continue to break various sign bylaws.

The small business owner expects to lose customers because of the city’s decision.

“I’ve done statistics,” Wood said. “I’ve not had them out there for a week at a certain time of year, and then I’ve had them out there, and it’s a 10 or 20 per cent increase in car count.”

“If you have a blight on the community, look at all the election signs everywhere,” he said, noting that the signs are put up by elected officials who voted for the bylaw change.

Wood said he’s struggling against larger chain companies.

“There are big companies, big million-dollar outfits here that do oil and changes. I’m trying everything I can to stay in business with ingenuity,” he said.

The city recently updated its sign bylaw over the summer.

“It’s to reduce sign clutter along some of our major arterial roads,” said Ryan Smith, the city’s community planning manager.

“Certainly in past development reviews, the RCMP has expressed some concerns, as well as planning staff, on that taking away from drivers’ attention on the road.”

“If you had 60 or 70 property owners along Highway 97 with different types of mannequins or moving signs with different types of effects, it starts to become a bit tacky,” Smith said.

“And we do get a lot of complaints already about the visual quality of that corridor,” he added.

Smith also noted that the mannequins didn’t meet the city’s old sign bylaw.

Wood can apply for a bylaw variance for his mannequins, Smith said.