Street Blade Signs Changing (All Uppercase > Mixed Case)?

[brownpelican]

Baton Rouge uses the same Times New Roman font for their blades in the downtown area. Everywhere else, it is Clearview, I believe.


Anthony

The Clearview look appears on some of the newest illuminated blades at traffic intersections. I only spotted them on Airline Highway and Sherwood Forest Boulevard. The rest of the new blades and illuminated blades are Series D, I believe.

[brownpelican]

And Jackson State U's Times New Roman signs look ok for that font. And I didn't know that mixed-case newspaper fonts were allowed on road signs.

I believe the city changed the blades last year, not long after renaming Metro Parkway west of Terry Road "Robert Smith Jr. Pkwy". They also renamed Terry Road north of I-20 University Blvd.

[txstateends]

Times New Roman can die in a fire.

Believe me, I'll be the first in line to throw it in the burn barrel!!!   It's bad enough that it's the de-facto computer font for docs/spreadsheets, but for street signs?? >UGH<

[apeman33]

Bookman and Palatino sneak away while all the attention is focused on Times New Roman.

[myosh_tino]

Bookman and Palatino sneak away while all the attention is focused on Times New Roman.

Funny you should mention Bookman...

This is how the street blades in my hometown look like.  They started using Bookman on the street blades in 2005 and IMO, it looks good aesthetically.

[mjb2002]

Baton Rouge uses the same Times New Roman font for their blades in the downtown area. Everywhere else, it is Clearview, I believe.


Anthony

Baton Rouge changes sign blades (downtown) again?! Isn't that the third time in 10 years?

They change their signs like how the MUTCD changes their manuals.

[roadfro]

Baton Rouge changes sign blades (downtown) again?! Isn't that the third time in 10 years?

They change their signs like how the MUTCD changes their manuals.

By a Notice of Proposed Amendments in the Federal Register, public comment period, then Final Rule action?



EDIT: Fixed quote

[mjb2002]

Have any of you been following county government web pages? If yes, are they or have they held a bidding contest on who gets to replace the non-compliant street name signs with compliant ones?

I found out that Barnwell County, S.C. had held a bidding contest in July. No word yet on who will change the signs here.

[architect77]

Before they enacted the law requiring all county/rural roads to have blades with names (to aid emergency responders), North Carolina used to have these unique blades at every rural intersection. Most are gone now, but these remain in Rolesville, NC, halfway between Raleigh and my hometown of Louisburg. I guess the lower sign that's cut off is the State Road number.

[mjb2002]

They should have continued to allow such blades (like what NC used to have) up until the 2009 MUTCD. Then require blades with names. I tell you, you don't require blades with names unless all of them are gonna be mixed case. The feds screwed that up with the 1993 MUTCD. Nice to see them finally correct that 16 years later.

[roadfro]

^ There was no 1993 MUTCD. National manuals were published in 1988 and 2000.

[MDOTFanFB]

Spotted this in Riverview, MI yesterday:



And yes, it is common for Southeast Michigan counties and their communities to exclude the suffix on their street signs.

[tdindy88]

And yes, it is common for Southeast Michigan counties and their communities to exclude the suffix on their street signs.

And why is that may I ask? Is there a reason for leaving the suffix off? And so I am relavent to this topic, in case anyone is interested, I've seen in both Indianapolis and Muncie (two towns I frequent a lot) some newer signs with mixed case. In the case of Indy, there are three kinds of signs: the ones at stoplights, the ones at interesections with a major road that may not be a stoplight, and the ones at the intersection of small residential streets, each type of sign decreasing is size. The bottom two classes were redesigned about 10 to 15 years ago with all upper-case letters, but there are now some with mixed-case lettering popping up here and there. The signs at the stoplights were already designed in mixed-case, and in Highway Gothic I might add, so those shouldn't change. Muncie as well as started changing a few signs to mixed case, with the first letter appearing a little too big for the rest of the name, so it looks a bit off. The Indy ones IMO look decent for mixed case.

[mjb2002]

The suffix, as I mentioned two or three pages back, is optional. Which is why there is no standard (lettering, font, color, etc.) for suffixes on a street name sign. The same with numbering, direction and pictographs -- all of which are also optional.

Someone also mentioned in this thread that subdivisions in larger cities do not use the suffix. So, the sign in SE Mich. might be in a subdivision.

[NE2]

Someone also mentioned in this thread that subdivisions in larger cities do not use the suffix. So, the sign in SE Mich. might be in a subdivision.

Do you mean a recent residential subdivision? Most parts of cities are in platted subdivisions.

[Scott5114]

And yes, it is common for Southeast Michigan counties and their communities to exclude the suffix on their street signs.

And why is that may I ask? Is there a reason for leaving the suffix off?

I suppose theoretically it reduces message loading by a scant amount and thus allows the important information (the street name) more prominence, which is pretty much the same justification for omitting the state name from interstate shields. Depending on the design it could also allow the sign to be smaller and thus less costly. That said in cases where you do not have another street with the same base name and a different suffix (21st St., 21st Terr.), it is really not essential information because most people tend to omit it in speech anyway. (I have noticed that a good percentage of times I have asked for addresses verbally at work I will get it in the form "2000 N.W. 81st" or "2424 W. Reno" with no suffix.)

[MDOTFanFB]

Someone also mentioned in this thread that subdivisions in larger cities do not use the suffix. So, the sign in SE Mich. might be in a subdivision.

That intersection was nowhere near a subdivision. I've even seen street signs in downtown Detroit lacking the suffix. Where I live (Wyandotte), they too lack the suffix, as well as many communities I've been in in Metro Detroit.

[apeman33]

And yes, it is common for Southeast Michigan counties and their communities to exclude the suffix on their street signs.

And why is that may I ask? Is there a reason for leaving the suffix off? And so I am relavent to this topic, in case anyone is interested, I've seen in both Indianapolis and Muncie (two towns I frequent a lot) some newer signs with mixed case. In the case of Indy, there are three kinds of signs: the ones at stoplights, the ones at interesections with a major road that may not be a stoplight, and the ones at the intersection of small residential streets, each type of sign decreasing is size. The bottom two classes were redesigned about 10 to 15 years ago with all upper-case letters, but there are now some with mixed-case lettering popping up here and there. The signs at the stoplights were already designed in mixed-case, and in Highway Gothic I might add, so those shouldn't change. Muncie as well as started changing a few signs to mixed case, with the first letter appearing a little too big for the rest of the name, so it looks a bit off. The Indy ones IMO look decent for mixed case.

Most of Wichita's street signs don't have the "St." (unless it a numbered street) or "Ave." In some cases, "Blvd." is also omitted. However any road does have the "Rd." the majority of the time (Rock Rd., Tyler Rd., Maize Rd., etc.)

[roadfro]

Is there a reason for leaving the suffix off?

I suppose theoretically it reduces message loading by a scant amount and thus allows the important information (the street name) more prominence, which is pretty much the same justification for omitting the state name from interstate shields. Depending on the design it could also allow the sign to be smaller and thus less costly. That said in cases where you do not have another street with the same base name and a different suffix (21st St., 21st Terr.), it is really not essential information because most people tend to omit it in speech anyway. (I have noticed that a good percentage of times I have asked for addresses verbally at work I will get it in the form "2000 N.W. 81st" or "2424 W. Reno" with no suffix.)

The Las Vegas area went to leaving the suffix off on it's overhead internally-illuminated street name signs at traffic signals for a while (simultaneously converting *to* all uppercase lettering). I assumed it was a legibility/message loading sort of thing, and suffixes were always omitted in everyday speech anyway. After some time, they've reverted to mixed case for these overhead signs, and now format them as they do the normal blades with direction, suffix and block number on the sides in smaller print.

[Brandon]

Someone also mentioned in this thread that subdivisions in larger cities do not use the suffix. So, the sign in SE Mich. might be in a subdivision.

Do you mean a recent residential subdivision? Most parts of cities are in platted subdivisions.

No, that's quite common in SE Michigan.  Even Gd River and Telegraph get the treatment.

[us175]

This new style is rolling out now in Jacksonville, TX.  Apparently there was a popularity contest among 4 choices that locals got to vote on, and the style in the pic was the winner (this came from the local newspaper's website); I didn't get to see a pic of the other 3 choices, so I'm not sure whether Clearview was ever a consideration on any of them.  I'm not sure what font this is, but I don't remember ever seeing it on a guide sign or blade before.  This is the first instance of Jacksonville using a a city logo/image on their street blades and also the first to use any block numbering on them.  This is also the first use of blue on street blades since the days when the city had the old concrete posts and dark blue coated metal signs.  I have a pic somewhere in my stuff of one of the city's last known instances of that kind of sign; I'll try to post it later if I find it.

EDIT:::: Forgot, it's also the first local use of upper/lowercase.  All known previous versions used uppercase.

[agentsteel53]

I do not like the font for "Highway 79" but I do like the logo... very Texan.  would be cool if they combined that logo with Highway Gothic Series C mixed case (maybe D if it fits?) for the street name.

[Scott5114]

The placement of block numbering and cardinal direction makes it feel really cluttered, and the font doesn't help.

I have always thought that Springfield, Missouri has among the most attractive layout for sign blades. The only bad thing is that it doesn't take to numbered streets too well.


Kansas City, KS has a fairly spartan, yet attractive design, though it's in all caps. (Sadly I don't seem to have any photos handy.) It will be interesting to see how it translates to mixed-case–I didn't see any mixed-case signage the last time I was there, which was in July.

[roadman65]

Orange County, FL street signs have been moved to mixed cases over 20 year period.

[burgess87]

The Town of Yates, NY has made the switch from all uppercase to mixed-case street blades.  I'm about to go take a picture or two - will be back shortly.