Article

Times Square digital signage kicks off National Parks PSA

Out-of-home and digital out-of-home working together for nationwide two-year PSA campaign targeting millennials for National Parks Service anniversary.

April 3, 2015

The capital of the world and the capital of digital signage, New York City's Times Square, lit up recently for a high-tech kickoff to celebrate possibly the least-tech experience possible.

The out-of-home advertising industry has partnered with the National Park Foundation, the official charity of America's national parks, to help launch a nationwide public service campaign celebrating the centennial anniversary of the National Park Service in 2016, according to an announcement from the Outdoor Advertising Association of America. Part of a multifaceted two-year public awareness effort encouraging people of all backgrounds, particularly millennials, to discover and reconnect with their public lands, the OOH campaign is intended to help drive awareness and understanding of parks and deepen pubic engagement, the OAAA said.

Find Your Park, which kicked off earlier this week, was celebrated in Times Square and Madison Square Park at official launch events with Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell, National Park Service Director Jonathan B. Jarvis and National Park Foundation Interim President Dan Wenk. During the Times Square event, digital billboards displayed arresting images of national parks, and similar creative will be displayed on billboards, bus shelters and buses across the country through May. Media space has been donated.

Following the event in Times Square, the National Park Foundation hosted an interactive event in Madison Square Park that connected people digitally to national parks across the country through Find Your Park Virtual View Kiosks. Mobile billboards also offered participants a look at the OOH campaign creative.

"Find Your Park invites people to see that a park can be more than a place. It can be a feeling of inspiration. It can be a sense of community. It can foster a deeply personal connection, or provide unparalleled common ground," said Dan Wenk, interim president of the National Park Foundation. "This extensive OOH effort is invaluable to the Find Your Park movement as it's sharing this idea with people across the country, in both rural and urban areas."

Today marks the start of Phase 1 of the OOH public service campaign. In June, the OOH industry will launch Phase 2 with more visually powerful executions that will juxtapose images of a well-known national park with lesser-known national parks and National Park Service programs, designed to further push awareness and understanding of all that the National Park Service is and does. In 2016, Phase 3 OOH creative will focus on celebrating the centennial.

In special recognition of Earth Day, which falls during National Park Week, the OOH industry will launch a national digital roadblock on April 22 featuring the Phase 1 creative on DOOH formats across the U.S., the OAAA said.

"OOH is the ideal medium to bring visually stunning images of landscapes and monuments to the American people, some of whom are likely learning about their national parks for the first time," OAAA President and CEO Nancy Fletcher said. "The OOH industry is honored to be a part of this historic campaign and to help all generations find their park."