In a 1989 FHWA video about signing practices (https://archive.org/details/gov.dot.fhwa.ttp.vh-48j) (skip to about 4:50), I found this photo of an overly busy guide sign assembly near Miami–I assume at the southern terminus of the (then) Sunshine State Parkway just before the Golden Glades Interchange.
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7588/16991471052_ff6f8e4d8a_o.png)
Beyond the obvious overloading of the assembly, a few things stood out:
- The photo would appear to be a black and white still, but does anyone know if the guide sign background was actually black? It looks too dark to be dark green.
- I've seen non-cutout route shields and directional plates affixed to guide signs, but the negative contrast letters on white plates which are then attached to a dark background seem needlessly bizarre.
- Notice the upside-down "W" and what appear to be small cap "I" s in "Miami" .
- This might be an optical illusion, but are those two people at the bottom-center of the photo? That can't be the case (this assembly would 30 feet high if so)...but I can't make out what those figures are if not people.
- The sign directs Miami Beach traffic across FL 826 (and assumably down A1A after that), but wouldn't a much more direct route, even back then, be I-95 south to either the Tuttle or Mac Arthur causeways?
I can confidently say this guide sign was long gone before 1989.
I'm guessing they just overlaid some standard shields on a background sign; usually wide SR shields were used on BGS, and black-on-white cutouts were used on large signs. White guide signs to denote destinations were also a local standard, but I think they were phased out around the early-1970s (I've read that a few still stand!) for green ones with white lettering.
Extra panel for Palmetto Exp(ress)way - it was renamed from "Palmetto Bypass Expressway" a few years after it opened to traffic in 1961. But it's possible the sign was erected before the Golden Glades Interchange was finished around 1968.
There's no I-95 North designation because most of it wasn't completed north of US 441 and FL 9 until the early-to-mid 1970s.
"Miami Beach" also might refer to the city of North Miami Beach, which FL 826 runs right through.
Even by Florida's occasionally erratic following of standards, this sign was a design mess.