California Observations

[pctech]

It doesn't seem that Caltrans has any consistent plan for freeway signage. I prefer the embedded exit tabs over the little tabs on the above freeway sign.

Mark

[myosh_tino]

Downtown Los Angeles and vicinity still has a bunch of left exits.  Here's a cool mix of a left-tab and a not-quite-center tab:

Snapped a pic of this yesterday while coming back from Hollywood.  It's in the area where the 1971 exit numbering experiment took place, so while not exactly a carbon-copy, the use of external tabs is highly intriguing (and on old structures, nonetheless!).

Actually, the old signs did not sport exit numbers (see this photo from the AARoads Gallery) and I prefer the old signs to these newer ones.  I'm not entirely sure why Caltrans added CA-60 shields to the Mission Road exit and US 101 pull through signs but it certainly did clutter things up.

Anyways, I made an attempt to clean up this gantry but my drawing seems to be a bit wider than the actual signs.  Are the lanes on this particular stretch of 101 narrower than the standard 12 ft?

[national highway 1]

Why does Caltrans sign an alternate route to I-5, I-10 and CA 60 from Mission Rd?

[mgk920]

Why does Caltrans sign an alternate route to I-5, I-10 and CA 60 from Mission Rd?

I agree, those 'alts' make the sign look needlessly cluttered and confusing (at least make the 'alt' shields smaller).

Also, the new federal MUTCD requires up-pointing arrows for each lane.



Mike

[blawp]

They forgot the Santa Ana control city. Shame on them.

[myosh_tino]

Why does Caltrans sign an alternate route to I-5, I-10 and CA 60 from Mission Rd?

Looking at a map, it appears drivers can take the Mission Rd exit and connect to I-5 north of the I-5/I-10 interchange.  The original signs did not include a CA-60 shield and I''m not sure why it was added to the new signs.  IMO all the CA-60 shield does is clutter up the signs.

Also, the new federal MUTCD requires up-pointing arrows for each lane.

Ummm... only in certain signing conditions (multi-lane exit at a major interchange where there's an option lane) are up-pointing arrows (arrow-per-lane signs) required.

Anyways, good luck with that one.  I am still of the belief that you will never see a plain vanilla FHWA MUTCD arrow-per-lane (APL) sign in California although it wouldn't surprise me if Caltrans develops some sort of strange hybrid that sort of looks like an APL sign.

They forgot the Santa Ana control city. Shame on them.

On the actual signs, there's no room for a control city because of all the shields being used (US-101, I-5 and CA-60).  On my drawing,I could make room for "Santa Ana" by shifting the shields to the top part of the sign.

[roadfro]

Why does Caltrans sign an alternate route to I-5, I-10 and CA 60 from Mission Rd?

Looking at a map, it appears drivers can take the Mission Rd exit and connect to I-5 north of the I-5/I-10 interchange.  The original signs did not include a CA-60 shield and I''m not sure why it was added to the new signs.  IMO all the CA-60 shield does is clutter up the signs.

Looking at the map myself, it appears Mission Road can act as a reasonable alternative access to I-5 south and I-10 east. However, I would not have signed that as an alternative route to CA 60 east...that doesn't appear to be an easily-recognizable alt route. I do see logic in putting the CA 60 east on the pull-through though.

[myosh_tino]

Here's an updated drawing that matches more closely the actual signs photographed by luokou.  First the current signs...

Note: According to my approximations, the current signs are 120 inches tall and they appear to be mounted to a larger truss.  My trusses were drawn to current Caltrans spec.

And here's how I would like the signs on this gantry to look like...

[nexus73]

Myosh, I like your final layout!  Now when will Caltrans bring you on board?

Rick

[myosh_tino]

Myosh, I like your final layout!  Now when will Caltrans bring you on board?

Rick

Heh, thanks for the kind words but it does bring up an interesting point that I don't know the answer to... who is doing the sign designs and layouts... Caltrans HQ or at the district level?

[pctech]

I do like the uniform sign size that Caltrans uses on BGS. Here they are "all over the place". (louisiana) I'm learning to like the embedded exit# tabs too.

Mark

[Occidental Tourist]

Looking at the map myself, it appears Mission Road can act as a reasonable alternative access to I-5 south and I-10 east. However, I would not have signed that as an alternative route to CA 60 east...that doesn't appear to be an easily-recognizable alt route. I do see logic in putting the CA 60 east on the pull-through though.

I *think* it's a throwback to the days when the Los Angeles Street onramp and the Alameda Street onramp and offramp were closer together.  Before the Gold Line bridge went in, the Alameda onramp and offramp were about 100 yards to the east of their current location.  There was also no protected merge lane for Alameda onramp traffic like there is now, but the Alameda onramp merged into the same lane used by Los Angeles Street onramp traffic.  This meant that Alameda onramp traffic would sometimes have to stop (or not!) before entering the freeway to yield to the Los Angeles Street onramp traffic.   Also, the Los Angeles onramp traffic would itself get slowed down by vehicles slowing down quickly and entering the lane to exit the rather short Alameda offramp or Alameda onramp vehicles barging their way in.  So that whole onramp/offramp/Mission Street collector lane would become a slow mess.

I surmise that the thought behind the "alt" access via Mission Street was that the onramp traffic from Alameda and Los Angeles might not be able to get up to speed in time to merge out of the collector lane at a safe speed, and so the collector lane was posted as an Alt to encourage Alameda onramp traffic not to freak out and try to force their way over one lane (or in the case of the 10 interchange, three lanes) at too slow a speed.

[jrouse]

Also, the new federal MUTCD requires up-pointing arrows for each lane.

Ummm... only in certain signing conditions (multi-lane exit at a major interchange where there's an option lane) are up-pointing arrows (arrow-per-lane signs) required.

Anyways, good luck with that one.  I am still of the belief that you will never see a plain vanilla FHWA MUTCD arrow-per-lane (APL) sign in California although it wouldn't surprise me if Caltrans develops some sort of strange hybrid that sort of looks like an APL sign.
[/quote]

The APL sign is proving to be difficult to implement in California.  I believe panel height and sign truss length are the two main issues...have not been directly involved in any of the discussions.  There are plans to put APL signs on I-5 at the junction with CA-1 near San Clemente.  I also know that there are some hybrid alternatives that were going to be explored.

[jrouse]

Myosh, I like your final layout!  Now when will Caltrans bring you on board?

Rick

Heh, thanks for the kind words but it does bring up an interesting point that I don't know the answer to... who is doing the sign designs and layouts... Caltrans HQ or at the district level?

Sign designs and layouts are performed by engineers at the district level or by consultants with district oversight.  HQ is responsible for developing general sign specifications and addressing issues with layouts, etc.

[J N Winkler]

Ummm... only in certain signing conditions (multi-lane exit at a major interchange where there's an option lane) are up-pointing arrows (arrow-per-lane signs) required.

The requirement is actually more limited than that--it applies only when all the conditions you list are met, and the through route TOTSOs.  In all other circumstances with option lane, an arrow-per-lane diagrammatic is optional.

[myosh_tino]

Heh, thanks for the kind words but it does bring up an interesting point that I don't know the answer to... who is doing the sign designs and layouts... Caltrans HQ or at the district level?

Sign designs and layouts are performed by engineers at the district level or by consultants with district oversight.  HQ is responsible for developing general sign specifications and addressing issues with layouts, etc.

So signs like this...


or this...


(drawn based on sign plans for the new Cordelia weigh station project on I-80 just west of Fairfield)

...were designed either by a consultant or an engineer in District 4.  Shouldn't the left down arrow on the Tully Road sign be a white-on-green down arrow instead of black-on-yellow?  I did mention this sign to Gary Richards during one of his weekly chat sessions on the Mercury News and he said he would look into it.  The layout of the I-80 pull through is one I have never seen before.  It looked like the sign designer was going to add down arrows to the I-80 sign but then realized he/she couldn't because of the interchange sequence sign.  For whatever reason, that layout looks weird.

[CentralCAroadgeek]

Speaking of the Tully Road sign, I've noticed last Friday that a new exit sign has been installed behind this sign (which is most likely to be removed soon), without the black-on-yellow arrow, but with strange fat-looking arrows. This would've been easier to explain if I had a picture, but unfortunately, I don't.

Off topic, I noticed that in my Street View link, someone got pulled over the behind sign.

[myosh_tino]

Speaking of the Tully Road sign, I've noticed last Friday that a new exit sign has been installed behind the original (which is most likely to be removed soon), without the black-on-yellow arrow, but with strange fat-looking arrows. This would've been easier to explain if I had a picture, but unfortunately, I don't.

These arrows you speak of are pointing up and angled to the right?  I suspect those are down-arrows that being used in place of the normal up-and-right exit arrow.  It's a practice that's become increasingly common in the S.F. Bay Area (I-580 at Isabel Avenue/CA-84 comes immediately to mind).

[CentralCAroadgeek]

Yes, the arrows I'm trying to describe are indeed pointing to the upper right.

These arrows you speak of are pointing up and angled to the right?  I suspect those are down-arrows that being used in place of the normal up-and-right exit arrow.  It's a practice that's become increasingly common in the S.F. Bay Area (I-580 at Isabel Avenue/CA-84 comes immediately to mind).

Do you have any pictures? GSV doesn't seem to show me, as the Isabel Ave intersection is shown as under construction.

[myosh_tino]

The APL sign is proving to be difficult to implement in California.  I believe panel height and sign truss length are the two main issues...have not been directly involved in any of the discussions.  There are plans to put APL signs on I-5 at the junction with CA-1 near San Clemente.  I also know that there are some hybrid alternatives that were going to be explored.

I took a look at the I-5/CA-1 junction in San Clemente and the existing box-beam sign bridge is very wide and could accommodate an arrow-per-lane sign that might look like this...



The sign in my drawing is the standard 120" tall guide sign that is the max allowable under current Caltrans guidelines.  There is just enough room, vertically, on the pull-through section to place the route marker, cardinal direction and control city.  The extra area to the right of the existing CA-1 exit sign is where I put the control city and street name for CA-1.

[kphoger]

Of course, that would be much more doable with shorter arrows.  I mean, come one, they don't really need to be that long, and we all know it.

[Occidental Tourist]

The sign in my drawing is the standard 120" tall guide sign that is the max allowable under current Caltrans guidelines.  There is just enough room, vertically, on the pull-through section to place the route marker, cardinal direction and control city.  The extra area to the right of the existing CA-1 exit sign is where I put the control city and street name for CA-1.

Don't you know that District 12 has a massive inferiority complex, and resultantly they are now signing (or greening over) Santa Ana as the control city both ways on pull throughs within OC?

[CentralCAroadgeek]

Don't you know that District 12 has a massive inferiority complex, and resultantly they are now signing (or greening over) Santa Ana as the control city both ways on BGSs within OC?

So the new control city is LA? How about southbound?

[Occidental Tourist]

Don't you know that District 12 has a massive inferiority complex, and resultantly they are now signing (or greening over) Santa Ana as the control city both ways on BGSs within OC?

So the new control city is LA? How about southbound?

No, I was imprecise with my wording.  Northbound, the old control city was LA.  The new control city northbound, as of a few years ago, is now Santa Ana. 
E.g., http://maps.google.com/?ll=33.739472,-117.830086&spn=0.060383,0.132093&t=h&z=14&layer=c&cbll=33.739578,-117.830461&panoid=ySjxTwzDaOhKZno5-n9dJw&cbp=12,269.94,,0,0 and
http://maps.google.com/?ll=33.733548,-117.833519&spn=0.060387,0.132093&t=h&z=14&layer=c&cbll=33.733645,-117.833527&panoid=4yiIDEADPR1qpbXPCWzW_Q&cbp=12,31.04,,0,-7.57

But . . . Santa Ana as the control city is only used on pull throughs and BGSs, not on signs on adjacent streets.  They don't want to spend the money to green over the original "Los Angeles" all of the appurtenant signs (which is good, because there are still a fair number of unspoiled button copy on the adjacent arterials).  
E.g., http://maps.google.com/?ll=33.630415,-117.719107&spn=0.060745,0.132093&t=h&z=14&layer=c&cbll=33.628857,-117.717763&panoid=WTGdUwGIRLWdpN1o1G4Xuw&cbp=12,270.02,,0,0 and
http://maps.google.com/?ll=33.638132,-117.729492&spn=0.06074,0.132093&t=h&z=14&layer=c&cbll=33.637918,-117.72937&panoid=7Olz4WhwwwP41nWd0nMf-w&cbp=12,328.37,,1,-4.46

Southbound the control city was always Santa Ana, except for about a 10-year period in the late 90s when they were widening the 5 between Buena Park and Santa Ana, at which point they started signing all of the pull throughs and adjacent street signs with San Diego as a control city from Buena Park through Santa Ana.  A few years ago, when they started replacing signs in conjunction with CalNEXUS, they suddenly reversed policy again and started putting Santa Ana back up as the control city southbound.

So here's the state of things:  You can get on the 5 northbound in South OC with an onramp sign that shows Los Angeles at the control city, and immediately encounter a pull through on the mainline that shows Santa Ana as the control city.  You can then turnaround in Anaheim and get on the 5 southbound, see an onramp sign that shows San Diego as a control city, and immediately encounter a pull through that shows Santa Ana as a control city.  E.g., http://maps.google.com/?ll=33.832467,-117.934359&spn=0.007575,0.016512&t=h&z=17&layer=c&cbll=33.832438,-117.934195&panoid=8Dao0b8_H_l0hwAspXWvXg&cbp=12,307.16,,0,1.11

[nexus73]

The APL sign is proving to be difficult to implement in California.  I believe panel height and sign truss length are the two main issues...have not been directly involved in any of the discussions.  There are plans to put APL signs on I-5 at the junction with CA-1 near San Clemente.  I also know that there are some hybrid alternatives that were going to be explored.

I took a look at the I-5/CA-1 junction in San Clemente and the existing box-beam sign bridge is very wide and could accommodate an arrow-per-lane sign that might look like this...



The sign in my drawing is the standard 120" tall guide sign that is the max allowable under current Caltrans guidelines.  There is just enough room, vertically, on the pull-through section to place the route marker, cardinal direction and control city.  The extra area to the right of the existing CA-1 exit sign is where I put the control city and street name for CA-1.

To me, that sign with upward arrows looks ugly.  I am so used to the downward arrows that if I drove to SoCal and saw the arrows reversed, I would wonder what kind of alternate universe I had entered...LOL!

To OC:How does one lose Santa Ana as a control city on the Santa Ana Freeway for chrissakes?  That's it's name and me being a traditionalist, it had better stay that way until the Day Of The Big One hits and wipes SoCal off the map a la the movie "2012"!

Rick