I had a chance to drive I-84 in CT at night and noticed that the few dark green non-reflective button copy BGSes are easier to read than the reflective ones. How about your area?
If you have a chance drive I-84 in Waterbury, only 5 or so left. (WB Exit 24 & Exit 23) (EB signs on C&D road and CT-69 off Exit 23)
Also,
CT has been putting up pipe-style gantries lately like there is no tomorrow. That is great, but a lot of the signs barely stretch out over the right shoulder and a lot are obscured by trees or not that noticable. Are they being cheap and by not paying for the extra pipe to extend it over the travel lanes at least?
I sorta agree - the reflective background can wash out the button copy letters. On the other hand, that requires the button copy to be clean. If it's dirty, which happens a lot in snowy states like up here, then the reflective background helps because the letters themselves are non-reflective. And this is why reflective lettering is taking hold. (:
Quote from: AlpsROADS on September 12, 2010, 12:33:25 AM
I sorta agree - the reflective background can wash out the button copy letters. On the other hand, that requires the button copy to be clean. If it's dirty, which happens a lot in snowy states like up here, then the reflective background helps because the letters themselves are non-reflective. And this is why reflective lettering is taking hold. (:
Isn't button copy not supposed to be used with a reflective background in the first place? (i.e. CalTrans classic forest green underneath button copy) That way, at night, the non-reflective portion doesn't brighten up anywhere as much as the button copy legend, while at day, the contrast is much better than an all-reflective surface (something that makes the new reflective signs in Sacramento frustrating at times - severe glare at the wrong sun angles).
There was never a specific prohibition against using button copy with retroreflective sheeting and in fact that was the Arizona DOT standard for many years.
CT and NJ are largely still signed with reflective button copy. Ohio is slowly losing its tremendous amount of same. Non-reflective backgrounds were almost completely out by the mid-80s.
New York traditionally signed with button-copy and reflective sheeting and I never noticed any problem reading the legend at night. New Jersey years ago did the same as Calif. At night the button-copy would contrast well with what appeared to be a "black" background. Both were effective, though I always preferred NY's bright green.
I-680 in Walnut creek has a combination of pipe gantries and dark green signs. They're being lazy about adding exit tabs, so there's a reflective exit tab on a dark green button-copy sign.
Quote from: KEK Inc. on September 15, 2010, 08:41:00 PM
I-680 in Walnut creek has a combination of pipe gantries and dark green signs. They're being lazy about adding exit tabs, so there's a reflective exit tab on a dark green button-copy sign.
That's not lazy; that's cost-cutting. No sense in replacing a perfectly good sign.