State-specific exit tab designs

[NE2]

That I-80/180 sign (I assume that's Iowa?)

Illinois.

[PurdueBill]

You're probably never going to see a centered Clearview exit tab because the new MUTCD requires that tabs be right or left justified depending on whether the exit is a right or left exit.  Hopefully Clearview will just go away, never to be heard from again but I digress.

Did someone ask for centered Clearview exit tabs?



Courtesy IDOT District 3.

Oops.  I stand corrected but I still don't like Clearview 

From Steve's I-80 IL page, a Summa 1976 photo....very little has changed except for ugly Clearview arriving on the scene!

[Kacie Jane]

From Steve's I-80 IL page, a Summa 1976 photo....very little has changed except for ugly Clearview arriving on the scene!

I have to wonder then if there was a similarly identical non-button copy FHWA version sometime between 1976 and 2012.

[PurdueBill]

From Steve's I-80 IL page, a Summa 1976 photo....very little has changed except for ugly Clearview arriving on the scene!

I have to wonder then if there was a similarly identical non-button copy FHWA version sometime between 1976 and 2012.

Street View suggests yes--also with centered exit tab!

Somehow I bet the exact same designs have been replicated over and over--note that the pull-through sign doesn't have the larger capital W in WEST.

[Brandon]

From Steve's I-80 IL page, a Summa 1976 photo....very little has changed except for ugly Clearview arriving on the scene!

I have to wonder then if there was a similarly identical non-button copy FHWA version sometime between 1976 and 2012.

Yes, there was.  Never got a picture of it though.  It's three generations of the same near-identical sign.

IDOT appears to be into cloning.

[Takumi]

VDOT has made a lot of carbon copy BGS's over the years as well, even those with outdated routing on them, but the exit tabs are nothing special.

[architect77]

I-40 through Raleigh has many older centered tabs, though the newer ones aren't. Over the next 3 years NCDOT will be completely tearing up (concrete a couple of feet deep) and rebuilding I-40(just beyond these photos). Concrete barriers will reduce capacity to only 2 lanes, and the anticipated traffic nightmare has been dubbed "Crawleigh."

[national highway 1]

That I-80/180 sign (I assume that's Iowa?) combines the two things I hate in BGS's.  Clearview and Center-tabbing.

Nope, it's in Illinois.

[1995hoo]

VDOT has made a lot of carbon copy BGS's over the years as well, even those with outdated routing on them, but the exit tabs are nothing special.

To me the most unique exit tabs in Virginia are the signs on the Beltway's Inner Loop Local lanes for Exit 177 (US-1 and Washington Street in Alexandria, although Washington Street is marked as "Mount Vernon"). The signs are unique because even though they're within Virginia's territory, they're very clearly Maryland-spec signs. This picture from Scott Kozel's site was taken four years ago. Other things have changed through there, but the signs still look like this, and Virginia does not normally make signs that look like these (presumably Maryland posted them under some agreement between the states as part of the construction project):




BTW, I must say I rather like the gantry in that picture. Maryland's been using that style, in various colors, on a number of roads (including the Intercounty Connector, where they're brown), and I think they look nicer than the rather industrial-looking girder style Virginia prefers (and the new ones on the Beltway through the 495 Express Lanes area tend to look sort of like box girders).

[PHLBOS]

BTW, I must say I rather like the gantry in that picture. Maryland's been using that style, in various colors, on a number of roads (including the Intercounty Connector, where they're brown), and I think they look nicer than the rather industrial-looking girder style Virginia prefers (and the new ones on the Beltway through the 495 Express Lanes area tend to look sort of like box girders).

Boston uses those style gantries along the open-air sections of its Big Dig portions of I-90, I-93 & MA 1A (near Logan Airport).

[vdeane]

I didn't know MD switched to using rounded tabs.

[StogieGuy7]

I didn't know MD switched to using rounded tabs.

Actually, they didn't.  It appears that way in the pic until you take a closer look.  The corners tend to blend in with the hazy background. 

Nice looking freeway though!

[PHLBOS]

I didn't know MD switched to using rounded tabs.

Actually, they didn't.  It appears that way in the pic until you take a closer look.  The corners tend to blend in with the hazy background. 

Nice looking freeway though!

Guys, If you're referring to the pic that 1995hoo posted; that gantry appears to be actually located in Virginia not Maryland.  While I know there is no toll on it but is the Woodrow Wilson Bridge run/maintained/signed by a separate agency (to VADOT or MD-DOT(?)) or is it a joint-venture between the 2 respective state DOTs (VA & MD)?  If it's the former (a separate agency), that could explain the use of a more unique-styled gantry.

[1995hoo]

I didn't know MD switched to using rounded tabs.

Actually, they didn't.  It appears that way in the pic until you take a closer look.  The corners tend to blend in with the hazy background. 

Nice looking freeway though!

Guys, If you're referring to the pic that 1995hoo posted; that gantry appears to be actually located in Virginia not Maryland.  While I know there is no toll on it but is the Woodrow Wilson Bridge run/maintained/signed by a separate agency (to VADOT or MD-DOT(?)) or is it a joint-venture between the 2 respective state DOTs (VA & MD)?  If it's the former (a separate agency), that could explain the use of a more unique-styled gantry.

Correct, the gantry is indeed in Virginia, and that was the point I was making when I posted it–the sign follows Maryland signage practices, especially with respect to the exit tabs and the gantry design, but it's absolutely located in Virginia (there's a cemetery located out of the picture to the right, and Jones Point Park is out of the picture to the left). The bridge is jointly owned and maintained by the two states' departments of transportation; while a minuscule portion passes through the District of Columbia, DC gave up any rights, ownership, or responsibility and instead granted Virginia and Maryland an easement through DC territory. I don't know how the two states have divided up the responsibility, but the signage on the bridge leads me to conclude that Maryland is probably responsible for maintaining that aspect. Standard Virginia signs would look quite different from those and the gantry would absolutely have a much more utilitarian, industrial look.

I didn't know MD switched to using rounded tabs.

Actually, they didn't.  It appears that way in the pic until you take a closer look.  The corners tend to blend in with the hazy background. 

Nice looking freeway though!

You should see it now. That picture dates back to 2008. Those lanes had just opened. The construction on the Beltway is now pretty much complete and we have a nice quad-carriageway "Local/Thru" configuration that varies between 2-2-2-2 and 3-2-2-3 at different points (the bridge itself is 3-2-2-3). It's been one of the biggest improvements I can remember in this area and I've lived here since 1974; most notably, the Beltway near my house used to be at a standstill every morning and evening during rush hour and now it flows freely between 60 and 80 mph.

Here's a more recent picture from Wikipedia, this one from 2009; it was taken a little further to the east (if you look in the background you can see the signs from the picture in my prior post). This one is in the "Thru" carriageway, which wasn't open when the previous picture was taken.






Edited to add:

For fun, I dug around on AARoads and RoadstotheFuture until I found a picture of how the Beltway looked around there prior to the construction. In the first picture I posted earlier (which I re-post here for comparison purposes), the "urban deck" behind the signs carries Washington Street (the George Washington Parkway, but it changes names in the City of Alexandria) over the Beltway. In the older picture here, that dingy old overpass carries Washington Street in precisely the same spot. The urban deck is wider, though.

 

This picture is from the other side of the "urban deck" and shows more typical Virginia exit tabs. This one, and the older picture shown above, may help clarify what I was getting at about Maryland-standard signage versus Virginia-standard signage. (Note also the more industrial-looking gantry. This picture is from AARoads.com from July 2010.)

[Takumi]

I've noticed on that section of the Beltway around the Wilson Bridge that VDOT and MDSHA work together on signage a lot. In both states, the signage looks pretty similar and there are correct shields for the opposite state.

[1995hoo]

....

I don't have a picture of it, but the sign for Exit 3A on northbound I-395 in Virginia has a left-mounted exit tab for a right-hand exit. (The pictures I can find online are all of the old sign, where the tab was a bit closer to the center.)

I made the comment above last week. Got a picture of the sign when I used that exit ramp yesterday. I don't normally mind Clearview, but I find this sign ugly in multiple ways (misplaced exit tab; too much space between the "3" and the "A"; "Duke St" text is too large; "Duke St" text is crammed too close to the shield):

[cpzilliacus]

To me the most unique exit tabs in Virginia are the signs on the Beltway's Inner Loop Local lanes for Exit 177 (US-1 and Washington Street in Alexandria, although Washington Street is marked as "Mount Vernon"). The signs are unique because even though they're within Virginia's territory, they're very clearly Maryland-spec signs. This picture from Scott Kozel's site was taken four years ago. Other things have changed through there, but the signs still look like this, and Virginia does not normally make signs that look like these (presumably Maryland posted them under some agreement between the states as part of the construction project):

Here's the deal regarding the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

The Maryland State Highway Administration was responsible for building the entire bridge, including those segments that stand in the District of Columbia (the draw span is, I believe, entirely in D.C.) and the approach structure in Virginia.

This is consistent with  other bridges across the Potomac River between Maryland and Virginia.  Because Maryland's territory extends to the high water mark on the Virginia side (though  there are some bays in the tidal section of the Potomac that belong to the Commonwealth), Maryland takes responsibility for the entire structure, including what connects the bridge to the highway network on the Virginia side.  That's the case with the I-495 (American Legion), U.S. 15 (Point of Rocks), Md. 17 (Brunswick) and U.S. 340 (Knoxville) bridges.

If you look in the Maryland SHA's Highway Location Reference, there is usually the text "BEGIN BRIDGE IN VIRGINIA" before the state line.

One exception (not sure why) is the U.S. 301 (Gov. Nice/Potomac River Bridge) between King George County, Va. and Charles County, which (according to the HLR) begins right at the Virginia border.

[1995hoo]

Here's the deal regarding the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

The Maryland State Highway Administration was responsible for building the entire bridge, including those segments that stand in the District of Columbia (the draw span is, I believe, entirely in D.C.) and the approach structure in Virginia.

....

Somewhere I have a picture that would let me confirm the draw span info. I took a bike ride across the bridge a year or two ago and took pictures. The bike/pedestrian path has markers showing where the state/territorial borders are. But I can't figure out where I saved the pictures!

[Interstatefan78]

Here are some of New Jersey specific exit tabs on I-78 East from Exit 3 up to 48 and also I-287 north from exit 1 to 37 both are taken from alps roads  http://www.alpsroads.net/roads/nj/i-287/n1.html and  http://www.alpsroads.net/roads/nj/i-78/e.html

[pctech]

I don't mind the exit tabs being to the left or right. There is an exit sign on 10 east in NOLA with the exit tab in the center on a "split sign" at Airline Hwy./Tulane Ave. exit. Calif. really needs to get it's act together!