I went through Los Angeles and Hollywood today and I’ll be posting pics for you guys once I get them edited and up. Just a quick 411 for the homies.

These were actually good ideas Caltrans put into action for once. Thorny bushes, vines covering sound walls, etc. Gotta’ give them that much.

Caltrans took a frustrating, seemingly intractable graffiti problem on Interstate 80 in Richmond and appears to be solving it with a creative solution. ChronicleWatch first wrote about this story Oct. 18 after transit officials and Richmond cops had spent months in a frustrating cat-and-mouse game with a group of taggers, who kept spraying obscenities and slurs along an I-80 stretch between the McBryde Avenue off-ramp and the Solano Avenue on-ramp. The taggers were vandalizing the large sound walls so often that they even struck again one night just hours after a Caltrans crew had cleaned off some graffiti. The next morning, thousands of commuters on the westbound freeway saw a new batch of vulgar words in bright yellow paint. But since then we’ve seen improvements and little or no graffiti because Caltrans crews have been cleaning up almost immediately.

As a long-term solution, though, Caltrans has begun planting vines and thorny bushes along the sound wall to make it less tempting for vandals. Once established, the vines will cover most of the wall’s visible surface and will be very difficult to remove by anyone intent on mischief. The thorny bushes also provide a disincentive to vandals, who like to work under cover of darkness.

Source: Richmond: A green solution to rude graffiti on I-80

As if they didn’t have it all covered by now here in Cali…

Graffiti vandals beware — there’s a new sheriff in town, and you won’t ever see him.

Broadband Discovery Systems, a two-year-old company based in Scotts Valley, has developed a series of devices finely tuned to detect the sound of an aerosol spray can from as far as 35 feet away.

“I despise graffiti,” said president and chief executive Cory Stephanson, who worked with a team of engineers to build the device aimed to stymie graffiti vandals.

Stephanson and vice president Michael Neely discovered that $22 billion is spent every year in the United States dealing with graffiti, and they think their latest innovation will help.

The device, nicknamed “Project Merlin” after Stephanson’s son, has intricate sound recognition features that are tuned to detect only the specific sounds an aerosol can makes. When the sensor detects the sound of a can dispensing, it uses cell-phone-like technology to send out an alert.

Read More: Graffiti detectors in the making

Just archiving an interesting news piece. Carry on.

The graffiti tagger “RESF” was apprehended by the PBP Graffiti Task Force at Brashear High School and charged with 5 counts of Graffiti Vandalism.

Police say the suspect was originally wanted for numerous counts of graffiti vandalism in the Brookline area of the City.

He was allegedly caught in the act of defacing a wall in November by a vigilant citizen who snapped a picture with a digital camera of him.

With the help of citizens of Pittsburgh, Graffiti Task Force was able to obtain information and apprehend the juvenile without incident.

Police believe the juvenile may also be responsible for tagging in the Dormont Area of the City.

That incident is currently under investigation with the Dormont Police Department.

Source: Pittsburgh Police Nab Graffiti Offender

The Montclair City Council unanimously approved an ordinance to toughen the fight against illegal graffiti vandalism throughout the city of Montclair. It seems this type of news is becoming more and more frequent around Southern California.

Council members Monday night unanimously approved an ordinance to toughen the fight against graffiti.

Under the new ordinance, property owners would be required to pay for removal after a certain number of graffiti occurrences, and face possible land-use conditions, said city Administrative Services Director Edward Starr.

Councilman Bill Ruh, who approved the ordinance, expressed his reservations over the ordinance because he did not believe property owners should have to pay a removal fee after already being victimized.

The city now sends graffiti abatement workers to remove graffiti. With approval of the ordinance, the city would provide up to three free removal services at vandalized properties. After the third removal, additional graffiti would prompt the city to issue a notice for the property owner to remove the graffiti themselves or pay the city for removal. Property owners would have four days to remove the graffiti or face consequences. The removal fee has yet to be determined.

The ordinance would also make parents of graffiti vandals liable for civil damages of up to $25,000 for each offense.

Read More: Montclair City Council approves graffiti ordinance