Welcome to Memphis, Birthplace Of Tacky Signage?

ACTION ALERT: The point of Effin' Memphis (or one of them, anyway), is to start mobilizing people to action in ways large and small, for the purpose of giving back to the city and making it a better place. Well, here is one place you can show up to make your voice heard.

When? 4:00 PM next Wednesday, March 6.

Where? The Downtown Review Board meeting at the Downtown Memphis Commission at 114 North Main.

What ghastly thing are we trying to prevent? Here is a rendering, via The Commercial Appeal, of the signage that Bass Pro Shops would like to stick on all sides of the Pyramid.

Noooooooooooo. Won't somebody please think of the children? The ones in Harbor Town? 

Bass Pro Shops wants eye-popping oval logo signs 90-foot-wide by 66-foot-high on each face of the 32-story Pyramid.  

Looming along the Interstate 40 gateway into Memphis, the big signs featuring a jumping largemouth bass logo would likely draw motorists’ attention from the other smaller outdoor billboards long in place and signs atop the office towers lining the Downtown riverfront.  

“Wow,” said architect Chooch Pickard upon seeing drawings of the signs for the first time. He called them “inappropriate in Downtown Memphis along the river.” 

"Wow," said the architect. Even better, the proposed signs are backlit, which means that everyone who lives in the area will be able to see our new Great Sphinx, in the form of a shining large-mouthed bass, glowing on their walls at night while they're trying to sleep.

So there you go. Show up at that meeting and make your voice heard.