America has been suffering from Renzo Piano fatigue. For years Mr. Piano seemed to be snapping up all the best commissions: the renovation of the Morgan Library & Museum in Manhattan, a science center in San Francisco and museum additions in Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago and Fort Worth.

Billboards get all sorts of (justified) flak for polluting our mind-scapes. They are everywhere, flaunting famous people — in expensive clothes, drinking sexy beer, promising us recession-busting discounts. Unfortunately, billboards are also responsible for a more tangible type of pollution. At the end of an advertising campaign, billboard workers roll up the heavy-grade vinyl and [...]