Sryacuse Airport NEXT RIGHT

[machias]

It looks like the contractor installing signs on NY Route 481 is struggling a little bit.

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/sign_on_i-481_near_syracuse_misspells_citys_name.html#incart_river_mobile_home

Plans:
https://www.dot.ny.gov/doing-business/opportunities/const-contract-docs?p_d_id=D263008


(update) Contract #D263008. Definitely contractor error.  It looks like it was Elderlee, Inc.

[J Route Z]

Oh my god.
It looks like Sorry = Sry (acuse).

[roadman]

While it's clearly unacceptable that the sign was actually installed this way, it looks to me like this was a classic case of a simple transposition of letters on the fabricator's part.  Does NYSDOT have procedures in place to require sign fabricators to submit final face drawings for approval before the sign panels are released for fabrication?  My experience has been that the shop people for sign companies clearly follow the "make it exactly as shown on the final drawings" mantra.

I'll also point out a basic design error with the sign.  Placing Syracuse Airport on one line makes the panel unnecessarily wide, especially given the sign location.

[vdeane]

Except if you put it on two lines it would look like two control cities - "Syracuse" and "Airport" instead of "Syracuse Airport".

[Roadgeek Adam]

I'm going to point something else out. Page of 18 of the same project has this little noticeable issue:



I edited in the (1), (2), and (3) to mark them, but a lot of NY 11.

[machias]

I'm also bothered by the abnormal spacing between Sryacuse and Airport. I would have just used "Airport" because I agree that sign quite large.

[mariethefoxy]

that happened on the island when they were replacing signs on the Robert Moses Causeway, someone mispelled Jones Beach on one of them.

[Sam]

www.whec.com/news/sryacuse-airport-road-sign-misspells-upstate-ny-city-name/4199967/.

There's a similar sign stacked outside the Elderlee plant today that appears to be spelled correctly.

[storm2k]

Except if you put it on two lines it would look like two control cities - "Syracuse" and "Airport" instead of "Syracuse Airport".

Disagree. Pretty sure no one has ever confused this as two destinations in all the years that there's been an iteration of this sign at this location.

[machias]

Except if you put it on two lines it would look like two control cities - "Syracuse" and "Airport" instead of "Syracuse Airport".

Disagree. Pretty sure no one has ever confused this as two destinations in all the years that there's been an iteration of this sign at this location.

And even if the motorist thought it was two destinations, the sign would still be correct. As NEXT RIGHT does take you to both Syracuse and the Airport (though not in that order).

[vdeane]

It's been fixed.
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/state_dot_replaces_misspelled_syracuse_airport_sign.html

Incidentally, in Region 4, they just say "Airport".

[roadman]

It's been fixed.
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/state_dot_replaces_misspelled_syracuse_airport_sign.html

So the story about DOT replacing the misspelled sign has a photo of the original sign, not the replacement sign.  But I guess that would be too much work for someone.

[Buffaboy]

Wow, how that wasn't caught I don't know.

[roadman]

Wow, how that wasn't caught I don't know.

The human mind can often convince people that words are spelled correctly when they're not, particularly when the error is a simple transposition of letters.  Add in the fact that sign installers aren't normally expected to verify that legends are correctly spelled, and you have the perfect setup for this type of error.

Even agencies that require their sign fabricators to submit final face drawings for approval before releasing signs for fabrication aren't totally immune from such problems.  In the late 1990s, during a sign replacement project on I-495 in Massachusetts, there was a misspelling at the Broad Street interchange in Merrimac that made it into the field.  Due to a simple transposition of letters on the fabricator's final face drawings that went unnoticed by the designer of record during their review (the design drawings for the project were correct), all six mainline overhead signs for this interchange (1 mile. 1/2 mile, exit direction for each way) were fabricated reading Borad Street.  The signs were installed exactly as fabricated, and all were subsequently removed two nights later once MassHighway's resident engineer noticed the error and informed the contractor.  Fortunately, the incident somehow managed to escape the attention of the local media - this being before the era of Twitter and Facebook.

[PurdueBill]

Swapped letters in proper names (Florida, Syracuse, Broad) are bad enough.  Swapped letters in directions are much worse.

NORHT (link to image; it's unedited and unnecessarily tall in the article link to this full-size one)

[machias]

It's been fixed.
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/state_dot_replaces_misspelled_syracuse_airport_sign.html

Incidentally, in Region 4, they just say "Airport".

There used to be much smaller signs that said "Airport / EXIT 9S" back in the day (mid 90s to mid 00s). I believe they were wooden signs.

[roadman]

Swapped letters in proper names (Florida, Syracuse, Broad) are bad enough.  Swapped letters in directions are much worse.

NORHT (link to image; it's unedited and unnecessarily tall in the article link to this full-size one)

I'll go you one better.  When MassHighway's contractor was replacing sign panels on I-93 between Somerville and Wilmington in the early 1990s, a few of the signs at entrance ramps to I-93 south went up reading "93 NOUTH Boston."  This error, which was corrected so quickly I was unable to get any photos of it, stemmed from the FHWA regional office's 11th hour demand that the initial letter for cardinal directions be elongated on all signs on the project.  In updating the mylars of the sign summary sheets to reflect this change, MassHighway's in-house draftsman got a little sloppy and put elongated N's where S's should have been.

[SidS1045]

I recall another spelling problem in MA also:  In the last sign replacement project on MA 2 in Lexington, the exit sign (exit 58?) for "Waverley" (correct spelling) had it spelled as "Waverly".  That was corrected at the time by moving the "y" over and adding the "e", meaning that the name was off-center.  (Waverley is a neighborhood within the town of Belmont.)  Unfortunately, the current GSV from that part of MA 2 (September 2013) still has the old signs.  I haven't been through there in a while, so that sign may have been rebuilt in the meantime.

[mrsman]

Wow, how that wasn't caught I don't know.

The human mind can often convince people that words are spelled correctly when they're not, particularly when the error is a simple transposition of letters.  Add in the fact that sign installers aren't normally expected to verify that legends are correctly spelled, and you have the perfect setup for this type of error.

Even agencies that require their sign fabricators to submit final face drawings for approval before releasing signs for fabrication aren't totally immune from such problems.  In the late 1990s, during a sign replacement project on I-495 in Massachusetts, there was a misspelling at the Broad Street interchange in Merrimac that made it into the field.  Due to a simple transposition of letters on the fabricator's final face drawings that went unnoticed by the designer of record during their review (the design drawings for the project were correct), all six mainline overhead signs for this interchange (1 mile. 1/2 mile, exit direction for each way) were fabricated reading Borad Street.  The signs were installed exactly as fabricated, and all were subsequently removed two nights later once MassHighway's resident engineer noticed the error and informed the contractor.  Fortunately, the incident somehow managed to escape the attention of the local media - this being before the era of Twitter and Facebook.

I would probably miss most of these misspellings myself if it were not for  the red wavy lines that appear under my writing.

[PHLBOS]

Reminds me of the PennDOT BGS' along US 222 erected a few years ago for the US 322 interchange that read Epharta rather than Ephrata.  Those signs were ultimately replaced with ones bearing the correct spelling after a similar embarrassing article was published about it.