When did your state install logo signs?

[ce929wax]

Maybe this has been covered before, but I was curious as to when other states first installed blue logo signs on their interstates and freeways.   Here in Michigan they tested them in the mid 90s and had them installed across the state by the early 2000s.  Before that, we had blue pictogram signs at each exit that would have a plate with a knife and fork for food, a gas pump for gas, and a bed for lodging.  Some exits in Michigan still have those pictogram signs in addition to the logo signs.

[Big John]

First saw one in Wisconsin in 1987.

[briantroutman]

Yes, the topic was discussed on a thread I started a few years ago–you might find some of the answers helpful.

[wriddle082]

I think KY was the very first state to install them, around 1985 I think.  WV was pretty early in the game as well, and was the first I ever saw that mostly used exit tabs on theirs.  I think I was in high school (early 90's) when TN first started installing them.

[Mapmikey]

Virginia first established rules for signing this stuff in Sept 1972...see pdf pages 24-27 at http://www.ctb.virginia.gov/meetings/minutes_pdf/CTB-09-1972-01.pdf.  This reference notes that the federal 1965 Highway Beautification Act authorizes specific signing for services.  The distance criteria initially set in Sept 1972 was revised in Nov 1972 (pdf pages 15-16 at http://www.ctb.virginia.gov/meetings/minutes_pdf/CTB-11-1972-01.pdf)

As of Feb 1975, logo signing was done only on I-95.  A Stuckey's along I-64 near Williamsburg petitioned the CTB to put logo signs along I-64 (page 15 at http://www.ctb.virginia.gov/meetings/minutes_pdf/CTB-02-1975-01.pdf)

Michael Summa photographed a logo assembly in Fredericksburg, VA in 1976: http://www.millenniumhwy.net/summa/summa-Pages/Image519.html

[jeffandnicole]

New Jersey was late to the game, and due to their relatively high prices for the logo signs you don't see too many in relation to the restaurants, gas stations and hotels that actually exist.  Because NJ is all urban or suburban, it's not like we have long stretches of barren highway with little towns clustered around interchanges with fast food and gas options.  In most cases, the highways were built thru already existing areas where the service options were already serving the locals, so their dependence on travelers thru the area is muted.

You can find the rare pictogram sign the OP referenced.  This is one that remains standing, somehow, for Exit 17 off of I-295 South.  https://goo.gl/maps/UygFs6VGws32  The gas station was closed long ago, and the hotel, a fancy place back in the day, is now about as sleezy as they come.  The phone...who knows where that is.  At least there are eating options (which were also shown on the much newer sign just before this sign's location: https://goo.gl/maps/7MCuxcTRG7k )

[roadman]

Massachusetts enacted legislation to give MassDPW authority to install LOGO signs in 1979 by amending Chapter 85, Section 2D, which had previously covered only generic services signs.  However, owing to the time lag in establishing a policy, the first LOGO installations did not begin appearing on state highway until about 1982.

[thenetwork]

On our cross-country family trip in 1983, it was either Iowa or Nebraska that was already using them en masse along I-80.

Ohio started "testing" the signs along I-75 between, IIRC, Findlay and Lima about 1988.  ODOT even had a BBS denoting the logo sign testing zone.

[roadman65]

I cannot speak for when FL did it, but NJ did it starting in the mid 90's.  My current home had them long before I moved here,

[roadman]

New Jersey was late to the game, and due to their relatively high prices for the logo signs you don't see too many

Noted that New Jersey's program is administered by a private company.  Wonder what percentage of those fees actually goes to the state.

[jon daly]

On our cross-country family trip in 1983, it was either Iowa or Nebraska that was already using them en masse along I-80.

That's a pretty impressive recall of detail. I recall Vermont having signs earlier than that, but they weren't blue.

[slorydn1]

They were already here on the interstates when I moved here in 1991, and I don't remember not seeing them in NC in any of my previous visits between 1985 and then.

They didn't add the ones here in New Bern on US-70 until the late 90's early 2000's as far as I can remember though.

[roadman65]

Along I-95 it was both VA and GA that administered them first.  I cannot say if those two were the first states to use them as Kansas or Washington could have had them in use already as growing up I never traveled much outside of the I-95 states.  In 1971 we did go to LA, but cannot remember what their GAS-FOOD-LODGING signs were like.

[machias]

I remember seeing them in Virginia in 1976. NYSDOT started in the early 1980s; they went up on Interstate 81 in 1982.

[jeffandnicole]

New Jersey was late to the game, and due to their relatively high prices for the logo signs you don't see too many

Noted that New Jersey's program is administered by a private company.  Wonder what percentage of those fees actually goes to the state.

I cannot speak for when FL did it, but NJ did it starting in the mid 90's.  My current home had them long before I moved here,

So, after a little research, it appears the signage program in NJ started in 1996. It's administered by New Jersey Logos, LLC, https://newjersey.interstatelogos.com/state/ , which is a subsidiary of https://www.interstatelogos.com/main/ which administers the program in a few dozen states. 

The website is actually interesting for a roadgeek:  If you click on NJ's page above, then click on the 'Find It!' tab at the top, you can keep clicking on the map until you drill down to individual signage, and see a picture of the signage displayed on the road!  Other than some slight GPS plotting marks being slightly off, the pictures appear current.

A NJDOT webpage displays the fees required of those wanting to participate in the program: https://www.state.nj.us/transportation/business/signs/logo/faq.shtm .  All the rules, rates, etc are covered here:  https://www.state.nj.us/transportation/about/rules/documents/Newrule1641E.pdf .  The one thing I didn't see was the percentage of the monies that went to NJDOT and the private company.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

I first remember them in Minnesota around 1996-97, but can only specifically say for a part of MN 100. There were probably other ones in places I didn't visit often enough.

[Pink Jazz]

Based on my research, the first logo signs in Arizona were installed circa 1988-1989.  For many years the program was administered by an outside vendor (Arizona Logo Sign Group, a subsidiary of Logo Signs of America), but the program was brought in-house in 2012 through a subsidiary of ADOT known as Grand Canyon State Logo Signs (GCSLS), with GCSLS expanding the program to urban areas a year later.

[roadman65]

New Jersey was late to the game, and due to their relatively high prices for the logo signs you don't see too many

Noted that New Jersey's program is administered by a private company.  Wonder what percentage of those fees actually goes to the state.

I cannot speak for when FL did it, but NJ did it starting in the mid 90's.  My current home had them long before I moved here,

So, after a little research, it appears the signage program in NJ started in 1996. It's administered by New Jersey Logos, LLC, https://newjersey.interstatelogos.com/state/ , which is a subsidiary of https://www.interstatelogos.com/main/ which administers the program in a few dozen states. 

The website is actually interesting for a roadgeek:  If you click on NJ's page above, then click on the 'Find It!' tab at the top, you can keep clicking on the map until you drill down to individual signage, and see a picture of the signage displayed on the road!  Other than some slight GPS plotting marks being slightly off, the pictures appear current.

A NJDOT webpage displays the fees required of those wanting to participate in the program: https://www.state.nj.us/transportation/business/signs/logo/faq.shtm .  All the rules, rates, etc are covered here:  https://www.state.nj.us/transportation/about/rules/documents/Newrule1641E.pdf .  The one thing I didn't see was the percentage of the monies that went to NJDOT and the private company.

Are the Shop Rite Logo signs on many NJ non freeways that you see at intersections that point you toward a supermarket of theirs off the beaten path part of the same program?