The Restaurants' Association of Ireland is seeking legal advice on a move by Dublin City Council to ban sandwich boards in parts of the city centre.
The local authority is introducing the ban on advertising boards outside protected structures and at locations within the city's Architectural Conservation Areas.
There are 23 such areas in the city centre, covering streets across the city centre with high concentrations of shops and restaurants -- including restaurant hotspots like Drury Street, South William Street, and George's Street.
Outside of these areas, businesses and retailers will have to pay €630 a year to use sandwich boards on public footpaths from next month.
The new rules come into force on September 1st.
Adrian Cummins, CEO of the Restaurant Association of Ireland says it's a blow for small businesses.
"While we do want regulation with regards to sandwich boards on streets, this is another tax-collecting measure by Dublin city council," he said.
"Businesses are asking themselves where businesses are asking themselves the question 'Where does their rates go and how are those rates being spent in Dublin at the moment."
The city council said it had consulted extensively with restaurateurs and retailers ahead of the move -- and said the sandwich boards were causing major problems.
"The policy is now being adopted due to the proliferation of 'A' Boards across the City which creates issues for pedestrian mobility, particularly for the visually impaired," it said in a statement issued today.
It added the sandwich boards were highlighted as the "biggest issue facing mobility and visually impaired [people] in the city" by the Disability Federation.
"Rather than introducing a blanket ban on A Boards, the Council will license the placing of [sandwich boards] on public paths in locations where they can be placed without causing obstruction or hindrance to pedestrian traffic and not in Architectural Conservation Areas or outside protected structures," it added.
