Unique, Odd, or Interesting Signs aka The good, the bad, and the ugly

[kphoger]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/33642153378/in/dateposted-public/
North end of US 69 ALT in Cherokee County, KS has the arrow for US 69 & 160 all wrong!  It goes not only left but straight ahead as well.

Arrows were correct back in 2014.

[roadman65]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/33642153378/in/dateposted-public/
North end of US 69 ALT in Cherokee County, KS has the arrow for US 69 & 160 all wrong!  It goes not only left but straight ahead as well.

Arrows were correct back in 2014.

More interesting as well as even badder that it used to be correct and the wrong arrow was made to replace it.

Furthermore we have this one up further.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/47472796512/

[roadman65]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/47511498641/in/dateposted-public/ Here is one that KDOT usually uses this format with City or Unincorporated Limits is the area's speed limit.

[kphoger]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/47511498641/in/dateposted-public/

Here is one that KDOT usually uses this format with City or Unincorporated Limits is the area's speed limit.

What's unique or interesting with this one?  Looks completely normal to me.

[D-Dey65]

Old road signs, including one really weird old Stop sign at the R.E. Olds Transportation Museum:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:R._E._Olds_Transportation_Museum_July_2018_65_(1974_Diamond_REO_C119_Raider).jpg

[rarnold]

Old road signs, including one really weird old Stop sign at the R.E. Olds Transportation Museum:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:R._E._Olds_Transportation_Museum_July_2018_65_(1974_Diamond_REO_C119_Raider).jpg

I am assuming that you are referring to the "ordinance corner" stop sign? Since it is from Michigan, maybe it has to do with the Northwest Ordinance of 1787?

[roadman65]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/47574616531/in/dateposted-public/
I find this sign assembly at the first ever SPUI in Clearwater, FL to be odd but tells the truth though. Since US 19 was upgraded to full freeway through Clearwater, now there are no direct ramps to it from Highway 60. So the "TO" banners are correct, but the N and S for Frontage Road (and the all upper case too) is very unusual.

[jakeroot]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54480415@N08/47574616531/in/dateposted-public/
I find this sign assembly at the first ever SPUI in Clearwater, FL to be odd but tells the truth though. Since US 19 was upgraded to full freeway through Clearwater, now there are no direct ramps to it from Highway 60. So the "TO" banners are correct, but the N and S for Frontage Road (and the all upper case too) is very unusual.

Are the roads not called "Frontage Road S" and "Frontage Road N"?

[ipeters61]

I remember seeing on Alps Roads many years ago the ET(?) "Buckle Up" sign: https://www.alpsroads.net/roads/ct/us_44/

Well, I found another one today out of the corner of my eye on Upper King Road near Camden DE today (unfortunately blurry on Google Maps): https://goo.gl/maps/ptxA3XkUZZs.  It's at the entrance to the Delaware Division of Communications, I believe.

[ipeters61]

I don't like to post immediately after myself, but I was biking around Dover just now and noticed this older pedestrian sign on Walker Road (at Pear Street, I have no idea what Justis Street is in reference to).



I also saw this older looking "Load Limit" sign on a residential street.

[Big John]

^^ and the informal spelling of "midnight".

[noelbotevera]

I don't like to post immediately after myself, but I was biking around Dover just now and noticed this older pedestrian sign on Walker Road (at Pear Street, I have no idea what Justis Street is in reference to).

(snip)

Looks like someone pasted it onto the sign. Font looks off, and some of the letters look crooked.

[Mapmikey]

I don't like to post immediately after myself, but I was biking around Dover just now and noticed this older pedestrian sign on Walker Road (at Pear Street, I have no idea what Justis Street is in reference to).

Came from Wilmington DE.  They rehabbed one side of Justis St and repurposed those signs.  This one looks the most like the one now in Dover in terms of dirt pattern...

https://goo.gl/maps/j6PoVcvt2Xs

[billpa]

I know we're the land of the wordy signs but holy hell.

Pixel 2

[Tom958]

GDOT's latest major signage screwup, on I-20 eastbound approaching downtown Atlanta. After seeing a friend's photo of this yesterday, I thought that perhaps the erroneous sign had been designed and fabricated correctly, but installed in the wrong place. Now, though, it's obvious to me that someone thought that what you see here is correct. Wow.

As you can see, the Windsor Street sign has arrows pointing up and to the right, directing traffic across the path of vehicles following the down arrow to the McDaniel Street exit. That's why I thought that this sign had been intended for the point of divergence of the Windsor Street offramp, not half a mile upstream as we're seeing here.

Beyond that, even if the arrows on the Windsor Street sign were pointing down, it's against the 2009 MUTCD to sign an option lane in that manner. Moreover, while has recently deviated from that part of the MUTCD by using both white-on-green and black-on-yellow arrows at the point of divergence instead of two black-on-yellows, GDOT has stuck to the MUTCD scheme of using only one black-on-yellow arrow in advance of the exit, with the option lane being hidden. I'm explaining this not just as a matter of consistency: the reason that the current MUTCD scheme of hiding the option lane instead of denoting it with a white-on-green arrow is that a significant proportion of drivers misinterpret the white-on-green arrow as denoting a lane drop, and thus make unnecessary lane changes, sometimes in a panic. At this location, there are six eastbound lanes, of which four can or must use three exits over the next three quarters of a mile, and message overload precludes signing the lane assignments in detail. This is a place to *avoid* prompting dubious lane changes.

On a more trivial note, the Windsor Street sign also has a full-width exit number tab. Some find it aesthetically appealing, but it's inconsistent with current GDOT practice. Myself, I'd probably consider it an endearing little quirk if the rest of the sign wasn't so badly designed, but I've developed an attitude about it now.

[Amtrakprod]

I've got a sign:
This sign ALWAYS bothered me because the yellow paint doesn't go up to the black line!


iPhone

[MNHighwayMan]

The custom diagram here for "do not drive onto tracks"
Washington Ave, Minneapolis



https://goo.gl/maps/zMsRZqGQWAo

[Eth]

GDOT's latest major signage screwup, on I-20 eastbound approaching downtown Atlanta. After seeing a friend's photo of this yesterday, I thought that perhaps the erroneous sign had been designed and fabricated correctly, but installed in the wrong place. Now, though, it's obvious to me that someone thought that what you see here is correct. Wow.

I was going to say that none of the rest of that actually precluded the explanation of "right sign, wrong location", but then there is the simple fact that there just wouldn't be enough space for it there.

Also, I'll again continue to espouse the opinion that the 2009 MUTCD practice actively prompts such unnecessary lane changes for exiting traffic by hiding the option lane, so I'll keep giving GDOT a pass for thumbing their nose at that particular provision.

So the only thing actually wrong with it is the angled up arrows instead of straight down arrows. (I mildly prefer the current-standard separate exit tabs, but it's not a big deal. This would look pretty much normal in, say, Washington.)

[kphoger]

The custom diagram here for "do not drive onto tracks"
Washington Ave, Minneapolis



https://goo.gl/maps/zMsRZqGQWAo

ON  TO

[Tom958]

GDOT's latest major signage screwup, on I-20 eastbound approaching downtown Atlanta. After seeing a friend's photo of this yesterday, I thought that perhaps the erroneous sign had been designed and fabricated correctly, but installed in the wrong place. Now, though, it's obvious to me that someone thought that what you see here is correct. Wow.

I was going to say that none of the rest of that actually precluded the explanation of "right sign, wrong location", but then there is the simple fact that there just wouldn't be enough space for it there.

Actually, there is a new sign there already: same format as the one in my photo, but rearranged so that the white arrow is directly under the S in State Farm. It fits, and I see nothing wrong with it. Oh: it has a right-indexed exit number tab, too.

Also, I'll again continue to espouse the opinion that the 2009 MUTCD practice actively prompts such unnecessary lane changes for exiting traffic by hiding the option lane, so I'll keep giving GDOT a pass for thumbing their nose at that particular provision.

I agree with you on that to a degree, but having heard about why that particular feature suddenly made in into the MUTCD only ten years ago after decades of real-world experience, I tend to ascribe at least some weight to the decision-making process. Besides that and perhaps more to the point: Georgia still doesn't have a consistent policy on this issue, with full-monte MUTCD-compliant installations being made along with deviations such as this. Among them, as I noted in that other thread:

Recently, the name of Freedom Parkway was changed to John Lewis Freedom Parkway, and the BGS's were replaced rather than greened over to accommodate the change. The exit only panels on the new signs are 2009 MUTCD compliant, with two black-on-yellow arrows instead on one white, one black. This could mean that the revolt on this is over, but I suspect and hope that it's a matter of whoever designed the signs not knowing that that aspect of the MUTCD was considered inoperative on the Downtown Connector  and on 85 in Gwinnett.

It's not policy. It's Calvinball, by an agency that doesn't even understand why arrows are supposed to point in certain directions under certain conditions. 

[roadman65]

https://goo.gl/maps/EKxk7YiUeWGQwHSK8
Like the way the pull through on I-440 is hanging beneath the gantry to keep the panels all aligned evenly at the bottom.

[Max Rockatansky]

Seems to be more oddball IN 49 shields than I recall from two years ago:

49INc by Max Rockatansky, on Flickr

[MNHighwayMan]

I also have to question the utility of both "end" and "ends ahead." Thanks for the warning?

[Max Rockatansky]

I also have to question the utility of both "end" and "ends ahead." Thanks for the warning?

Seemed to be pretty common on this last trip.  I saw "Ends"  placards in Illinois, Indiana and Ontario on this past trip. 

[ipeters61]

I also have to question the utility of both "end" and "ends ahead." Thanks for the warning?

Maryland likes to do "(ROAD A) ENDS AT (ROAD B)"