Two news articles caught my attention recently. The first was amusing; the second amazing. What foresight I showed by not making my posts here in all caps!!
You have got to be kidding me!
First the amusing -
GA leader: Boring names will stop rural sign theft
Sep 25, 11:15 PM (ET)
DARIEN, Ga. (AP) - A rural Georgia county is losing about 550 street signs a years to thieves and a commissioner says he has a solution: Make the names boring.
McIntosh County Commissioner Mark Douglas serves a rural county about 60 miles south of Savannah. He says signs marking Green Acres, Boone's Farm and Mary Jane Lane are frequently stolen.
He suspects the thieves are targeting those signs because they share names with a popular TV series, a low-cost wine or, in the third case, a slang term for marijuana.
Then there's the stolen signs for Harmony Hill. Douglas figures the thieves just like the alliteration.
It's become a costly problem. County Manager Luther Smart says the area is paying $17,000 a year to replace the signs.
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and then the amazing -
$27 million to change NYC signs from all-caps
By JEREMY OLSHAN
Last Updated: 11:07 AM, September 30, 2010
Posted: 12:53 AM, September 30, 2010
The Capital of the World is going lower-case.
Federal copy editors are demanding the city change its 250,900 street signs -- such as these for Perry Avenue in The Bronx -- from the all-caps style used for more than a century to ones that capitalize only the first letters.
Changing BROADWAY to Broadway will save lives, the Federal Highway Administration contends in its updated Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, citing improved readability.
At $110 per sign, it will also cost the state $27.6 million, city officials said.
"We have already started replacing the signs in The Bronx," city Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan told The Post. 'We will have 11,000 done by the end of this fiscal year, and the rest finished by 2018."
It appears e.e. cummings was right to eschew capital letters, federal officials explain.
Studies have shown that it is harder to read all-caps signs, and those extra milliseconds spent staring away from the road have been shown to increase the likelihood of accidents, particularly among older drivers, federal documents say.
The new regulations also require a change in font from the standard highway typeface to Clearview, which was specially developed for this purpose.
As a result, even numbered street signs will have to be replaced.
"Safety is this department's top priority," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said last year, in support of the new guidelines. "These new and updated standards will help make our nation's roads and bridges safer for drivers, construction workers and pedestrians alike."
The Highway Administration acknowledged that New York and other states "opposed the change, and suggested that the use of all upper-case letters remain an option," noting that "while the mixed-case words might be easier to read, the amount of improvement in legibility did not justify the cost."
To compensate for those concerns, in 2003, the administration allowed for a 15-year phase-in period ending in 2018.
Although the city did not begin replacing the signs until earlier this year, Sadik-Khan said they will have no trouble meeting the deadline, as some 8,000 signs a year are replaced annually simply due to wear and tear.
The new diminutive signs, which will also feature new reflective sheeting, may also reflect a kinder, gentler New York, she said.
"On the Internet, writing in all caps means you are shouting," she said. "Our new signs can quiet down, as well."
You have got to be kidding me!
First the amusing -
GA leader: Boring names will stop rural sign theft
Sep 25, 11:15 PM (ET)
DARIEN, Ga. (AP) - A rural Georgia county is losing about 550 street signs a years to thieves and a commissioner says he has a solution: Make the names boring.
McIntosh County Commissioner Mark Douglas serves a rural county about 60 miles south of Savannah. He says signs marking Green Acres, Boone's Farm and Mary Jane Lane are frequently stolen.
He suspects the thieves are targeting those signs because they share names with a popular TV series, a low-cost wine or, in the third case, a slang term for marijuana.
Then there's the stolen signs for Harmony Hill. Douglas figures the thieves just like the alliteration.
It's become a costly problem. County Manager Luther Smart says the area is paying $17,000 a year to replace the signs.
#####
and then the amazing -
$27 million to change NYC signs from all-caps
By JEREMY OLSHAN
Last Updated: 11:07 AM, September 30, 2010
Posted: 12:53 AM, September 30, 2010
The Capital of the World is going lower-case.
Federal copy editors are demanding the city change its 250,900 street signs -- such as these for Perry Avenue in The Bronx -- from the all-caps style used for more than a century to ones that capitalize only the first letters.
Changing BROADWAY to Broadway will save lives, the Federal Highway Administration contends in its updated Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, citing improved readability.
At $110 per sign, it will also cost the state $27.6 million, city officials said.
"We have already started replacing the signs in The Bronx," city Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan told The Post. 'We will have 11,000 done by the end of this fiscal year, and the rest finished by 2018."
It appears e.e. cummings was right to eschew capital letters, federal officials explain.
Studies have shown that it is harder to read all-caps signs, and those extra milliseconds spent staring away from the road have been shown to increase the likelihood of accidents, particularly among older drivers, federal documents say.
The new regulations also require a change in font from the standard highway typeface to Clearview, which was specially developed for this purpose.
As a result, even numbered street signs will have to be replaced.
"Safety is this department's top priority," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said last year, in support of the new guidelines. "These new and updated standards will help make our nation's roads and bridges safer for drivers, construction workers and pedestrians alike."
The Highway Administration acknowledged that New York and other states "opposed the change, and suggested that the use of all upper-case letters remain an option," noting that "while the mixed-case words might be easier to read, the amount of improvement in legibility did not justify the cost."
To compensate for those concerns, in 2003, the administration allowed for a 15-year phase-in period ending in 2018.
Although the city did not begin replacing the signs until earlier this year, Sadik-Khan said they will have no trouble meeting the deadline, as some 8,000 signs a year are replaced annually simply due to wear and tear.
The new diminutive signs, which will also feature new reflective sheeting, may also reflect a kinder, gentler New York, she said.
"On the Internet, writing in all caps means you are shouting," she said. "Our new signs can quiet down, as well."
And then there's the teenagers who like to steal road signs like Detour, Danger, Do not enter and even Stop signs to display in their rooms...
ReplyDeleteI get the caps thing because it IS easier and faster for me to read in lower case letters (with the first letter in caps of course)