AARoads: Gothic vs. Clearview Page

[Alex]

Just received an email that Clearview signs have been added to the Indiana East-West Toll Road. More specifically photos of Exits 10 and 14A now have signs in the font. Is just the toll road using it in the state?

[J N Winkler]

Just received an email that Clearview signs have been added to the Indiana East-West Toll Road. More specifically photos of Exits 10 and 14A now have signs in the font. Is just the toll road using it in the state?

Yes.  Indiana DOT signing plans are Series E Modified all the way down the line.

[hbelkins]

A note about the New Jersey entry. NJDOT is NOT using Clearview from what I've seen. The blurry example provided looks like a traffic light street sign installed by Somerset County DPW. They have been using a Clearview like font (it might actually be Transport Medium) for a few years in that application. NJDOT (along with the NJ Turnpike Authority) has stuck with the current FHWA fonts on their overhead signs.

I wanted to scroll back to see if any mention was made of New Jersey. I did spot (and photograph) some Clearview on eastbound I-676 in Camden.

[Alex]

Tweaked the page a bit. Eliminated the examples section, added Yes for Wisconsin based upon observations of it along the Beltine at Madison and for the aforementioned Indiana Toll Road usage. Added yellow to states where Clearview is used by some agencies, but not the main DOT. Tweaked a couple of other states' based upon comments made above.

[CL]

Utah should be yellow - Legacy Parkway is the only road in the state that has Clearview signage.

[agentsteel53]

Utah should be yellow - Legacy Parkway is the only road in the state that has Clearview signage.

was that done by a separate authority?

even the new UT-7 is Highway Gothic (at least, as of August, 2009)

[CL]

was that done by a separate authority?

even the new UT-7 is Highway Gothic (at least, as of August, 2009)

Nope, built and maintained by UDOT. I think they just wanted to use Legacy as a proving ground and nothing else (Clearview wasn't the only thing done differently on Legacy).

And yeah, all new signage Utah's installing is still Highway Gothic. The Southern Parkway/SR-7 extension (which opened November 2010) was signed in Gothic as well; Utah's stubbornly defying the Clearview trend. But now that Nevada's joined in...

[J N Winkler]

Utah should be yellow - Legacy Parkway is the only road in the state that has Clearview signage.

was that done by a separate authority?

even the new UT-7 is Highway Gothic (at least, as of August, 2009)

Nope.  The Legacy Parkway is totally UDOT's baby:  designed, bid, and built by UDOT.

UDOT has a late stage in its PS&E development process called "Plans in Hand," which I think corresponds to 90% or 95% design for state DOTs which express completion of design plans in percentages.  I have a copy of the Plans-In-Hand plans for the Legacy Parkway, which are (mostly) pattern-accurate and show the Legacy Parkway as U-67 on trailblazers and on advance guide and exit direction signs on interchanging freeways.  Series E Modified is used for all white-on-green legend.

Some months after UDOT made the Plans-In-Hand plans available to contractors, final plans were released for the Legacy Parkway, with a radically revised signing scheme.  These plans were not pattern-accurate except for route shields and for advance guide and exit direction signs on interchanging freeways.  It was not until pictures of Clearview signs on the Legacy Parkway were posted on this board that I realized lack of the Clearview fonts must have been the reason for the lack of pattern-accuracy in this version of the plans.  Also, all signing for U-67 disappeared, in favor of the present blades-of-grass marker.

For each state DOT for which I am able to obtain construction plans, I maintain a "witching directory" file which contains pattern-accurate sign design sheets extracted from those plans.  My UDOT witching directory includes signing sheets from the PIH stage but only the interchanging-road sheets from the final plans.

So, the long and short of it is that the Legacy Parkway became the testbed for Clearview in Utah virtually at the eleventh hour.

Edit:  Looking at the Clearview chart, I think North Dakota should be green.  NDDOT has gone over to Clearview body and soul.  With very few exceptions, the signing plans I have downloaded from NDDOT (and I have been following them since 2009) have been in Clearview.  NDDOT advertised a big sign rehabilitation on I-29 last year with about 40 pages of sign design sheets, all in Clearview.  I have my doubts about Ohio, which I would color yellow because the signing plans I have seen suggest that Ohio DOT is operating a "district option" policy with regard to Clearview.  Districts 6 and 8 still show Series E Modified on plans while District 12 has been showing largely Clearview.  But I can't be 100% sure because Ohio DOT has a very sketchy history of producing pattern-accurate signing plans.

[CL]

Utah should be yellow - Legacy Parkway is the only road in the state that has Clearview signage.

was that done by a separate authority?

even the new UT-7 is Highway Gothic (at least, as of August, 2009)

Nope.  The Legacy Parkway is totally UDOT's baby:  designed, bid, and built by UDOT.

UDOT has a late stage in its PS&E development process called "Plans in Hand," which I think corresponds to 90% or 95% design for state DOTs which express completion of design plans in percentages.  I have a copy of the Plans-In-Hand plans for the Legacy Parkway, which are (mostly) pattern-accurate and show the Legacy Parkway as U-67 on trailblazers and on advance guide and exit direction signs on interchanging freeways.  Series E Modified is used for all white-on-green legend.

Some months after UDOT made the Plans-In-Hand plans available to contractors, final plans were released for the Legacy Parkway, with a radically revised signing scheme.  These plans were not pattern-accurate except for route shields and for advance guide and exit direction signs on interchanging freeways.  It was not until pictures of Clearview signs on the Legacy Parkway were posted on this board that I realized lack of the Clearview fonts must have been the reason for the lack of pattern-accuracy in this version of the plans.  Also, all signing for U-67 disappeared, in favor of the present blades-of-grass marker.

For each state DOT for which I am able to obtain construction plans, I maintain a "witching directory" file which contains pattern-accurate sign design sheets extracted from those plans.  My UDOT witching directory includes signing sheets from the PIH stage but only the interchanging-road sheets from the final plans.

So, the long and short of it is that the Legacy Parkway became the testbed for Clearview in Utah virtually at the eleventh hour.

Wonderful insight! I had no idea that the plans once called for Highway Gothic to be used. I'd love to see those old Gothic plans for Legacy if you could email them to me. I wonder what inspired UDOT to use Legacy as a proving ground... in any event, if Utah were to completely switch over to Clearview I wouldn't lose sleep - the Legacy signs don't look bad at all.

[hbelkins]

Some New Jersey CV for your viewing pleasure...

[Ian]

North Dakota is now using clearview? Ugh. And lets hope NJDOT doesn't continue to use it.

[agentsteel53]

I saw Clearview in ND as far back as Feb '10.  Didn't see any in Apr '07.

ND is a pretty "ahead of the curve" state - I don't even know of any '57 spec interstate shields.  there are a few on mainline I-29 which use a variant of the '61 spec (smaller crown) and even those are looking pretty rough and may very well have been replaced by now.

[Ian]

Do the ones in ND look okay at least, or are they sloppy looking? Anyone also have photos? From what I've seen, I noticed Hawaii does its clearview pretty badly.

[Alex]

So, the long and short of it is that the Legacy Parkway became the testbed for Clearview in Utah virtually at the eleventh hour.

Edit:  Looking at the Clearview chart, I think North Dakota should be green.  NDDOT has gone over to Clearview body and soul.  With very few exceptions, the signing plans I have downloaded from NDDOT (and I have been following them since 2009) have been in Clearview.  NDDOT advertised a big sign rehabilitation on I-29 last year with about 40 pages of sign design sheets, all in Clearview.  I have my doubts about Ohio, which I would color yellow because the signing plans I have seen suggest that Ohio DOT is operating a "district option" policy with regard to Clearview.  Districts 6 and 8 still show Series E Modified on plans while District 12 has been showing largely Clearview.  But I can't be 100% sure because Ohio DOT has a very sketchy history of producing pattern-accurate signing plans.

Thanks for the updates, I have amended the page accordingly for North Dakota, Ohio and Utah.

[agentsteel53]

Do the ones in ND look okay at least, or are they sloppy looking? Anyone also have photos? From what I've seen, I noticed Hawaii does its clearview pretty badly.

I didn't take any photos, but I remember the signs being generally well-proportioned and looking similar to Texas issues.

[Ian]

Do the ones in ND look okay at least, or are they sloppy looking? Anyone also have photos? From what I've seen, I noticed Hawaii does its clearview pretty badly.

I didn't take any photos, but I remember the signs being generally well-proportioned and looking similar to Texas issues.

Well then that's a good thing.

[J N Winkler]

Alex--you're welcome.

Do the ones in ND look okay at least, or are they sloppy looking? Anyone also have photos? From what I've seen, I noticed Hawaii does its clearview pretty badly.

I didn't take any photos, but I remember the signs being generally well-proportioned and looking similar to Texas issues.

Actually, I think the quality is pretty uneven--more so than Texas.  In general NDDOT follows somewhat offbeat sign design rules:  thick borders and excess space between the border and the legend block.  Aside from oddities like larger shields for Interstates than for US highways on interchange sequence signs and the now-abandoned practice of using 48" two-digit shields for three-digit Interstates, TxDOT's basic approach to sign composition is vanilla.  I dug up the plans for the I-29 sign replacement, which has the NDDOT project number SIM-6-029(093)136 and covers I-29 from about Exit 138 to about Exit 168, and quite a lot of the signs had excess green space around the legend while others had the legend almost crashing into the borders.  On the plan sheets at least it does not look very good, frankly.

You don't have to take my word for any of this, BTW.  NDDOT has E-plans on their website (no login required).

http://www.dot.nd.gov/dotnet2/eplans/default.aspx

SIM-6-029(093)136 was advertised in the letting of November 19, 2010.

[agentsteel53]

Actually, I think the quality is pretty uneven--more so than Texas.  In general NDDOT follows somewhat offbeat sign design rules:  thick borders and excess space between the border and the legend block.  Aside from oddities like larger shields for Interstates than for US highways on interchange sequence signs and the now-abandoned practice of using 48" two-digit shields for three-digit Interstates, TxDOT's basic approach to sign composition is vanilla.  I dug up the plans for the I-29 sign replacement, which has the NDDOT project number SIM-6-029(093)136 and covers I-29 from about Exit 138 to about Exit 168, and quite a lot of the signs had excess green space around the legend while others had the legend almost crashing into the borders.  On the plan sheets at least it does not look very good, frankly.

You don't have to take my word for any of this, BTW.  NDDOT has E-plans on their website (no login required).

http://www.dot.nd.gov/dotnet2/eplans/default.aspx

SIM-6-029(093)136 was advertised in the letting of November 19, 2010.

the ones I saw were on US-10 as it ends at I-94 heading west out of Fargo.  I think that was it - that was a trip on which I attempted to follow US-10 across the whole state, so that led to a bunch of I-94 segments and I think those were all still in Highway Gothic except for those few gantries on the west end of Fargo.

[J N Winkler]

Yes, that must have been it.  NDDOT tends to do its freeway signing in Interstate 4R contracts and, more rarely, in pure Interstate sign replacement contracts.  I know of no pure signing work that has been done on I-94 yet, but I-94 has had a bunch of interchange rehabs and its turn for pure signing may come up soon.

[agentsteel53]

Yes, that must have been it.  NDDOT tends to do its freeway signing in Interstate 4R contracts and, more rarely, in pure Interstate sign replacement contracts.  I know of no pure signing work that has been done on I-94 yet, but I-94 has had a bunch of interchange rehabs and its turn for pure signing may come up soon.

furthermore, the small handful of signs must've all been done as part of the same project - therefore, my impression that ND's Clearview looks consistent and generally Texas-like.  I had been extrapolating from maybe 3-4 signs.

[mightyace]

While TDOT doesn't use Clearview, it should be noted that I've noticed that the city of Franklin, TN uses it.  Please update the entry for Tennessee accordingly.

Here is a sample as proof:


20100219 Royal Oaks Blvd @ TN 96-4 by mightyace, on Flickr


20100219 Royal Oaks Blvd @ TN 96-4C2 by mightyace, on Flickr

[hbelkins]

In Indiana, street signs in the Plainfield area (the commercial development near I-70 and IN 267) are in Clearview.

[Alex]

In Indiana, street signs in the Plainfield area (the commercial development near I-70 and IN 267) are in Clearview.

While TDOT doesn't use Clearview, it should be noted that I've noticed that the city of Franklin, TN uses it.  Please update the entry for Tennessee accordingly.

Noted and noted on the page, thanks!

[on_wisconsin]

Just to note, the City of Eau Claire, WI uses Clearview for there street signs/ blades.
EDIT

Some cities such as Eau Claire, Wis., have already been gradually replacing signs as they wear out. Brian Amundson, the city's public works director, says replacing signs is "a good, worthwhile program. It really does make a difference." - USAToday

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-10-21-road-signs-all-caps-lowercase_N.htm

[Eth]

It appears that Clearview can now be found in Georgia, specifically on street signs along US 78 in the Stone Mountain/Snellville area (unfortunately didn't have a camera with me when I saw them today, so no pics at the moment).  I'm guessing these were done by Gwinnett County, not GDOT.