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New Brown Highway Wayfinding Signs
I've noticed that the long-planned highway wayfinding signs are finally starting to pop up around St. Louis (at least two of them, anyway; one eastbound 40 at 20th Street, one westbound 40 before Grand).
These signs were evidently commissioned by the CVC after MODOT ruled that some of St. Louis' signage was not legal.
I'm very curious what the Egotist community thinks about these signs, both in concept and in execution. Conceptually I can see the need, but the execution is so terrible (IMHO) that I feel they set our city back 30 years. And there are alot more of them to come... these highways signs are just the first phase, with pedestrian scale signs soon filling our historic neighborhoods.
Let me know what you think!
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Here are the aforementioned signs.
I've only seen them in pictures so far, but I can't say that I'm excited to see them out in the environment. “Inspired by the city's French heritage?” Um, what?
While it sucks that the signs aren't nearly as good as they could have been, I see this as more of a missed opportunity than a major setback. Though there won't be well designed signage convincing tourists to visit new destinations, at least they'll still be able to find their way around.
On a related note, here's a stellar poston designing type for wayfinding.
I haven't seen these around town yet - either I'm really not focusing on driving or they just don't demand attention. Either way, from that KSDK picture I can straightaway tell you that they are pretty damn ugly. They look like wayfinding signs if you are in a Sheraton or Raddison hotel from the 1980's. I would definitely be curious to know who was behind these designs.
@Eric Thanks for calling out these signs. I did a little research and found that Corbin Design (http://www.corbindesign.com) did the work. They are a firm in Michigan that specializes in wayfinding. I could see why CVC would feel it necessary to partner with a specialist, but given this project is about promoting St. Louis, any number of local firms could have been involved. Maybe the photos aren't doing it justice, but the type choice looks like an afterthought—condensed and hard to read. I also think the French Heritage is some BS they used to sell their solution. I wouldn't doubt if a young, eager designer just wanted to use trendy flourishes to make it pretty. One more thing that always slays me—why does the Gateway Arch have to be employed for every St. Louis project? Here we are promoting all of this city's attractions and the one everybody knows about takes center stage on the top of every sign. Granted there are production limitations and government regulations, that may have impeded the solution, but I know there had to be a better one.
These are the specialists?
I finally saw the signs on the highway, and not only are they hideous, they're practically unreadable!
The brown blends right in with the land on the sides of the interstate, and at night they are virtually invisible.
I'm siding with Eric now — continued implementation of these will wipe STL off the map!
Anyone else up for some guerrilla public service?
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