Cherokee County, SC Sign Regulations: Freeway-Facing Signs (2026)

Cherokee County Code § 17-1, titled Billboards prohibited in scenic area of Peachoid Water Tank, is the county's rule aimed at signs facing the interstate corridor in unincorporated Cherokee County, South Carolina. Subsection (a) designates the Peachoid Water Tank and surrounding area as a scenic area. Subsection (b) then bars construction of any commercial billboard or other billboard within one thousand (1,000) feet east or west along the Interstate Frontage Road from the Peachoid Drive.

The words "or other billboard" matter. The ban is not limited to paid advertising, so a non-commercial message on a billboard-type structure is inside the prohibition too. It is a construction ban, and the measurement runs along the Interstate Frontage Road in both directions from Peachoid Drive, a total corridor of one thousand (1,000) feet on each side.

The exact boundary is drawn on a sketch. Subsection (b) says the sketch attached to the ordinance from which the section is derived more clearly shows the limits, and that the sketch is made a part of the section by reference. The Code's editor's note records that the sketch attached to an ordinance adopted August 16, 1999 has not been set out in the printed Code but is on file and available for inspection in the office of the county clerk. Anyone planning a sign near Peachoid Drive should read that sketch with the text.

The section carries a long amendment history. Its history note lists an ordinance of 1-7-86, one of 6-20-89 and one of 12-17-98.

Elsewhere in the county the Land Development Regulations treat billboards as a recognized lot type. Section 13-54 provides that the one-half (½) acre minimum lot size in § 13-52 does not apply to individual lots occupied solely by a billboard, that parcels conveyed for the sole purpose of locating a billboard are not subject to the minimum lot size requirement, that such lots do not include right-of-way, and that all such lots must have frontage on a public road right-of-way or other roadway complying with Cherokee County roadway specifications in § 13-82 et seq.