The Worst of Road Signs

[bassoon1986]

awful sign by GeoJosh, on Flickr


A friend of mine posted this to my Facebook bc he knows of my roadgeekery, so I have no idea who took the picture originally or if the signs are still like this. Did some map searching and this is just north of O'Hare in Chicagoland.


-- Fixed url/img coding. -rmf67

[Brandon]

^^ Looks like storm damage to me.  We've had four different derechos come through the area since late June, with the most recent one two weeks ago.

[thenetwork]

Here's an interesting array of signage:

[mapman1071]

Here's an interesting array of signage:

That signage is gonna be a cause of a accident!!!

[empirestate]

^^ Looks like storm damage to me.  We've had four different derechos come through the area since late June, with the most recent one two weeks ago.

Wow, only six more and you'll have a full-fledged Bill of Derechos!

[kphoger]

Here's an interesting array of signage:

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That signage is gonna be a cause of a accident!!!

What?  Turning right from a left lane isn't a good idea?

[1995hoo]

Here's an interesting array of signage:

Is that at the corner of Orange Avenue and East 30th Street near Cleveland? It appears from Google Maps that what the signs are meant to illustrate is that the road forks beyond the light and that one lane can go up the ramp to I-77 on the right or bear left on Woodland Avenue. But the sign would be clearer if the "straight-only" arrow were curved slightly. In other words, three lanes go through the light; once you're beyond the light, left lane bears left, right lane bears right, center lane can go either way.

It looks to me like this may be where that picture was taken.

[PurdueBill]

The Street View of it three years ago shows something more sensible--is the pic above more recent?  (The EML license plate suggests that it may be.)

Note that the ground-mounted sign in the distance also has the wonky two-pronged arrow that suggests turning right from the second lane from the left.  Looks like the straight arrow should have been changed to a bent right one in both places...

[thenetwork]

From what the Road Rant column of The Plain Dealer said, they added a second lane to the I-77 South on-ramp. Still puzzled as to why the powers that be couldn't find or make a better-arrowed sign?   

What's even more scary is that there is an off-ramp a few feet behind the photo location and people trying to turn right at the upcoming E. 30th Street intersection from I-77 have 3 lanes to cross in a short period of time. Thank goodness there aint much reason to go south on E.30th street from there!!!

[codyg1985]

The Street View of it three years ago shows something more sensible--is the pic above more recent?  (The EML license plate suggests that it may be.)

Note that the ground-mounted sign in the distance also has the wonky two-pronged arrow that suggests turning right from the second lane from the left.  Looks like the straight arrow should have been changed to a bent right one in both places...

Looks like that sign would work better if there were overhead BGS signs for each lane indicating where you are going. You can go in four different directions at this intersection. Lane arrows alone just doesn't seem to cut it. Talk about confusing...

[CentralCAroadgeek]

Not sure if this has already been posted in this thread before, so here it is again. One of many big, lazy unisigns along the I-5/US-12 duplex:


And its Canadian cousin in Vancouver:


Also a square I-84 shield in Portland:

[national highway 1]

Not sure if this has already been posted in this thread before, so here it is again. One of many along the I-5/US-12 duplex:

It's typically a Washington thing to have a white square around some of their interstate shields:


Actually I quite like the US 12 shield, maybe the rectangular black background is OKish.

And its Canadian cousin in Vancouver:

What? Clearview on the West Coast? That's absurd! 

Also a square I-84 shield in Portland:

Actually I like the black background around the I-84 shield, it's better than the white background. Works in harmony with the US 30 shield. 

[Brandon]

Actually I like the black background around the I-84 shield, it's better than the white background. Works in harmony with the US 30 shield. 

Makes me think of Wisconsin.  Black background interstate shields are very common there.

[KEK Inc.]

awful sign by GeoJosh, on Flickr


A friend of mine posted this to my Facebook bc he knows of my roadgeekery, so I have no idea who took the picture originally or if the signs are still like this. Did some map searching and this is just north of O'Hare in Chicagoland.


-- Fixed url/img coding. -rmf67

Haha, someone posted this on my FB wall as well.  He's not a roadgeek, so there's probably some blog that posted it. 

[national highway 1]

Shifty-looking digits on this US 231 shield.

Don't really like any of the shields in the foreground, i.e the hyphenated 'BYPASS' and the square 31W shield, no border but large characters for the WK Pkwy sign, and i do hate '70 spec interstate shields... 
But the 135^o arrow banners are alright.

[kphoger]

One of many big, lazy unisigns along the I-5/US-12 duplex:

I kinda like that, myself.

[hbelkins]

I don't recall ever seeing a "BYPASS" banner. All the one I can remember are "BY-PASS," hyphenated.

[xonhulu]

Not sure if this has already been posted in this thread before, so here it is again. One of many big, lazy unisigns along the I-5/US-12 duplex:

They'd look better if there was less border around the shields. Why not make the shields larger and fill up the space better?

Also a square I-84 shield in Portland:

There are a few of these on I-84 and I-5.  I'm glad ODOT abandoned this experiment -- they are pretty ugly to my eyes.  Of course, I think all shields should be cut-outs, so I'm biased.

[kkt]

There are a few of these on I-84 and I-5.  I'm glad ODOT abandoned this experiment -- they are pretty ugly to my eyes.  Of course, I think all shields should be cut-outs, so I'm biased.

I agree.  I think the black borders around the Interstate shield makes it look like it's in mourning.  It's also another color of paint.  If they can't afford cutouts, they should at least be white borders. 

[Brandon]

There are a few of these on I-84 and I-5.  I'm glad ODOT abandoned this experiment -- they are pretty ugly to my eyes.  Of course, I think all shields should be cut-outs, so I'm biased.

I agree.  I think the black borders around the Interstate shield makes it look like it's in mourning.  It's also another color of paint.  If they can't afford cutouts, they should at least be white borders. 

As I said, Wisconsin does this all the time, and has for almost 2 decades.

[Scott5114]

The black background at least makes it look like the every other shield out there. The white background just looks cheap, like a garage sale sign, or like they just forgot to finish it by cutting it out.

[hbelkins]

I wonder what the cost difference between full-size shields (materials) and cutouts (labor) is.

[Duke87]

I don't recall ever seeing a "BYPASS" banner. All the one I can remember are "BY-PASS," hyphenated.

Counterexample.

[Alps]

I wonder what the cost difference between full-size shields (materials) and cutouts (labor) is.

You don't save anything on materials. What are you going to do with the scraps/

[Scott5114]

I wonder what the cost difference between full-size shields (materials) and cutouts (labor) is.

You don't save anything on materials. What are you going to do with the scraps/

Melt them down and make a new blank out of them, theoretically. But I'm sure most sign shops don't have the equipment for that. You might be able to make an extra blank out of a sheet of metal with cutouts by being able to place the shields more closely together on the sheet, though.