Weird fractions on distance signs

[amroad17]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Also, on I-264 in Portsmouth, VA, Exit 3-Victory Blvd has a 1/3 MILE distance both east- and west-bound.

[Eth]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Without looking more closely at it, my guess would be a series of interchange reconfigurations (lengthened ramps, maybe) where they just didn't want to bother with moving the gantries afterward. This seems to be the reason why the advance signs on I-75 for GA 16 (exit 205) are for ¼ and ¾ mile instead of the more typical ½ and 1.

[ilpt4u]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Maybe they are prepping for Metric

1 1/4 Miles is very close to 2 Kilometers

[jeffandnicole]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Maybe they are prepping for Metric

1 1/4 Miles is very close to 2 Kilometers

In order to prep for it, there would need to be a deadline to change.  Or even a proposal. There isn't.

[csw]

Here are a few funky ones, in order of increasing oddity...

1/3 mile in Lexington, VA.


1000 ft in Denver, CO.


1/8 mile in Chicago, IL. One of several funky ones in Chicago, especially in the Loop.


3/8 mile in Scranton, PA.


1/5 mile in Roanoke, VA.

[ilpt4u]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Maybe they are prepping for Metric

1 1/4 Miles is very close to 2 Kilometers

In order to prep for it, there would need to be a deadline to change.  Or even a proposal. There isn't.

1 1/4 Miles is a perfectly fine Imperial measurement, but is typically less used than 1/2 or whole 1 Miles

But it is also the first relatively "clean"  fraction for miles that converts very easily to kilometers

Now if 1 1/4 Mile signs are followed by 5/8ths of a Mile signs...very Metric leaning then

[michravera]

This does not concern weird fractions as it does a "weird consistency":  Has any other member noticed that many advance exit signs on I-4 in Florida have a 1 1/4 MILES distance on them?  I noticed this back in June visiting my Dad in Lakeland and travelling up to Disney World (between Exits 33 and 64).

Maybe they are prepping for Metric

1 1/4 Miles is very close to 2 Kilometers

In order to prep for it, there would need to be a deadline to change.  Or even a proposal. There isn't.

1 1/4 Miles is a perfectly fine Imperial measurement, but is typically less used than 1/2 or whole 1 Miles

But it is also the first relatively "clean"  fraction for miles that converts very easily to kilometers

Now if 1 1/4 Mile signs are followed by 5/8ths of a Mile signs...very Metric leaning then

I *REALLY* want hundreds of meters when the distance is less than a mile and certainly less than 1 km. Of course, I would like metric everywhere.

[lepidopteran]

How about the largest mileage sign that has a fractional component?

Betcha can't beat this one.  On I-270 between Clarksburg and Germantown, MD.

[amroad17]

^ That is both inane and insane! 

[CNGL-Leudimin]

As well as the only way I would get 38 km when converting a sign (23 miles is 37 km; 24 miles is 38.6 km, rounds up to 39).

[roadman]

Here are a few funky ones, in order of increasing oddity...

1/3 mile in Lexington, VA.

1/3 mile used to be common in Massachusetts on the final advance sign for the second exit at a cloverleaf interchange.

[csw]

Went through the rest of my photos and found some more.

1/3 mile on another older Virginia spec overhead, this one in Charlottesville.


1/3 mile from I-39/90 in Beloit, WI.


3/8 mile approaching Harrisburg, PA, on US 15.


5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.


I think Pennsylvania is a hotbed for odd fractions.

[kphoger]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

[ilpt4u]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

5/8 mile...aka 1 km

[jeffandnicole]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

5/8 mile...aka 1 km

No one in PA is caring about that.

[formulanone]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

This is the best response...Although, I think that we'd probably wind up with 41/64th of a mile and a requirement to touch each light pole along the route.

Found a 1/8th on Wisconsin Route 30 in Madison:


Another 1/8, on US 131 in Grand Rapids:


A 1/10 on FL 50, east of Orlando:


I remember tenths being more common in Florida, though way back 25-30 years ago.

[JoePCool14]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

5/8 mile...aka 1 km

No one in PA is caring about that.

Clearview, stretched fraction, and also a seemingly fat US-19 shield?

[Roadsguy]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

5/8 mile...aka 1 km

No one in PA is caring about that.

Clearview, stretched fraction, and also a seemingly fat US-19 shield?

There isn't any Clearview on those signs. The signs were put up soon after the rescinding of Clearview's interim approval, so they're Highway Gothic, though it must have been a last-minute change in the plans as the text seems a bit oversized.

I don't know what's up with the "fat" US shield, though. I see that every so often in newer signs and even on the plans.

[formulanone]

5/8 mile from I-70/79 in Washington, PA.

This is why they shouldn't put Adrian Monk in charge of the design.  ½ mile would have been just fine.

5/8 mile...aka 1 km

No one in PA is caring about that.

Clearview, stretched fraction, and also a seemingly fat US-19 shield?

There isn't any Clearview on those signs. The signs were put up soon after the rescinding of Clearview's interim approval, so they're Highway Gothic, though it must have been a last-minute change in the plans as the text seems a bit oversized.

I don't know what's up with the "fat" US shield, though. I see that every so often in newer signs and even on the plans.

Sure enough, the "5/8" is vertically-compressed Clearview, the only time it's used on the whole panel. Click the image to see it at 2400 pixels:

[Bobby5280]

Ugh. So many terrible "home made" treatments of fractions on these signs.

Series Gothic is a primitive typeface with a very minimal character set. Modern typefaces in OpenType format often include wide variety of fraction figures and full 0-9 numerator and denominator number sets to accommodate any possible fraction, such as 3/16, 3/32.

Clearview Highway has a full numerator/denominator set of numerals along with figures for 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, 1/3, 2/3, 1/5 and 3/5. The complaint is Clearview's fractions are taller than the cap height of letters. Most DOTs prefer the slash mark to be equal to cap letter M-height and the numbers to fall in line with that. So some agencies that used Clearview didn't bother using the built-in fraction sets and home-brewed their own -which really is a kludge approach.

The artificially squished 5/8 Clearview fraction on that "Beau Street" sign was likely squeezed to make it equal to the size of "B" in "Beau."

[csw]

Two more from recent travels.

Yet another 3/8 near Pittsburgh, this one north on I-79.


Another 1/5 near the previous one I posted in Roanoke, VA.

[STLmapboy]

A 1/10 on FL 50, east of Orlando:


I remember tenths being more common in Florida, though way back 25-30 years ago.

Check out the placement of the numbers on the shields there. 

[Eth]

A 1/10 on FL 50, east of Orlando:


I remember tenths being more common in Florida, though way back 25-30 years ago.

Check out the placement of the numbers on the shields there. 

The number placement is normal; the problem is that the Florida state outlines on the shields have totally faded.

Incidentally, it looks like this sign has since been replaced; it now reads "700 feet" instead of "1/10 mile".

[formulanone]

Found an 8/10 on a bridge warning sign in Fon du Lac County, Wisconsin:

[michravera]

... miles is that they divide nicely into haves, thirds, quarters, fifths, sixths, eighths, tenths, and even elevenths and twelfths in whole feet...

The next time I see a sign saying X/11 or X/12 miles will be the first.

Seriously guys, can't we just agree to use meters (preferably in hundreds or rarely fifties maybe on city streets) for stuff shorter than a mile? or for intermediate distances between 1 and 2 miles? Is it that much of a stretch? I would like to go all metric, but meters for walkable distances should be the thing.

When I was in ON last month, I had to keep thinking about distances when I saw "Right, 300 m" or similar signs.  I have a feeling for  1 or 2 km.  But not for some several hundred meters.

100 m is basically the length of a football field (goal line-to-goal line in the CFL or including one end zone in the US) or one 16-to-a-mile block. I think of "300 m" as "3 blocks" or "3 fields".