[subego]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Highway Gothic is the standard, while Clearview was introduced to help with readability of reflective signs. It is not always good at that, so there are a lot of places where the fonts are mixed. And not necessarily because the powers that be decided to use Clearview where it was better and Highway Gothic where Clearview didn’t do as well. Mostly it’s a money issue: those signs are not inexpensive.

I prefer HG as a typeface, but lord have mercy the keming on that sign is unforgivable.

Clearview does strike me as more readable, especially because of the larger holes.

[subego]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Leave it to TxDOT to make signage EVEN WORSE.

My wife and I actually took several of the Houston-area tollways in April, going from San Antonio to Galveston. While the signage was “less than optimum”, it wasn’t as bad as it often is, in Houston or elsewhere. Like yesterday, I was on Loop 1604 in San Antonio, trying (not quite desperately) to exit on Babcock Rd, so as to avoid the Even Worse (note just capitalized, not all caps) construction at the 1604/I10 interchange. I’ve used that exit zillions of times. But not yesterday because it just isn’t there (due to construction, of course). What’s also not there? ANY signage that points out the exit is closed. None ANYWHERE.

I don’t know if it’s this way everywhere, but freeway work in Texas exemplifies the ‘50s Sci Fi trope of “it was necessary to destroy the world in order to save it”. Just substitute “freeway” for “world”, and “make it better” for “save it”.

Now that I think about it, I don’t really use signs on the interstate any more. I just trust Waze. It generally isn’t horrible past the usual issues with the pathfinder not understanding real-world conditions*. At the least, it’ll wave me off closed exits.

However, I fully admit my ability to navigate on my own, which used to be very good, has severely atrophied over the last 10 years of using it.

*My current example is it sends me on the shortest route home from work, but that necessitates a turn where there’s really bad visibility of oncoming traffic. Longer route makes that turn much easier.

[andi*pandi]

Clearview seems to have a more open 'a' (fine) and a very high x-height (I don't care for). Perhaps because they are newer signs on the left are brighter and easier to read. That isn't on the typeface though. Highway has more character. Clearview or whoever typeset the signs the kerning is horrible. Signage might be more letterspaced to help with distance reading, but spaced WELL.

I don't trust siri or google as far as I can throw them. Sure I use them but having a sign show up to confirm the exit is indeed 72b is very reassuring.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by subego 

However, I fully admit my ability to navigate on my own, which used to be very good, has severely atrophied over the last 10 years of using it.

I've found that I cannot navigate myself to somewhere I've gotten to via phone navigation before. I have to physically struggle through finding the exits and the turns and orienting myself in that space on my own and them I'm usually good at finding it again. If I use nav once, I have to use it every time.

*My current example is it sends me on the shortest route home from work, but that necessitates a turn where there’s really bad visibility of oncoming traffic. Longer route makes that turn much easier.

Over the last 10 years the area around me and further out from the city has expanded a lot. The quickest way to the interstate involves an uncontrolled left turn onto a 55mph 4 lane road without a median in between. When I first moved in it was pretty easy to squirt into traffic, but over time it became more and more difficult to get a gap. They developed an area of my neighborhood 5-6 years back that included a new road that gives me access to a stoplight, but requires a couple extra blocks of neighborhoods. Nav still gets mad at me for going the wrong way but the stoplight is getting me onto that main road way faster and safer than trying to jet into the middle of traffic.

[subego]

Ayup.

Bonus points if the uncontrolled left is one block downstream from a stoplight, so the lane you have to turn into is perpetually filled with cars waiting at the light.

[Laminar]

There's enough of a gap that traffic only backs up during rush hour, which doesn't last too long.

[subego]

Quoted for reference:

Originally Posted by subego 

Clearview Highway (left) or Highway Gothic (right)?

Originally Posted by andi*pandi 

Clearview seems to have a more open 'a' (fine) and a very high x-height (I don't care for). Perhaps because they are newer signs on the left are brighter and easier to read. That isn't on the typeface though. Highway has more character. Clearview or whoever typeset the signs the kerning is horrible. Signage might be more letterspaced to help with distance reading, but spaced WELL.

I don't trust siri or google as far as I can throw them. Sure I use them but having a sign show up to confirm the exit is indeed 72b is very reassuring.

The Clearview “o” is more open, and while it’s not on display here, the “e” is much better. Again, the HG “e” has, ahem… character, but it’s really bad for readability. Clearview also nicked the swoosh “l” from the font they use on the autobahn.

With HG, I like the surprisingly subtle motif of the slashes at the top of the verticals.

As an aside, Market Street Road? Is it a street or a road. Make up your fucking mind, Texas.

[andi*pandi]

Also confusing: Sam Houston Parkway, or Tollway? Maybe name some things after other people?

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by andi*pandi 

Also confusing: Sam Houston Parkway, or Tollway? Maybe name some things after other people?

The answer is “yes”. Details here. Short answer: the Parkway is a loop around Houston. 88 miles worth of it.

The Tollway is most of the controlled access (freeway) portion of the loop. Tolls are fairly modest, and the Really Big Thing about this tollway (as with almost all such tollways in Texas) is that you pay for the convenience of low congestion.

And it works. Cheap out and stay on the surface streets, or pay a toll and get where you’re going a lot sooner. I don’t know if this sort of thing would help in LA, but I’ve seen how it’s helped in Houston. I don’t “like” the basic concept (especially the way they did it in Houston, where the un-tolled freeway segments are essentially just so you can transition from one major freeway to another), but it does work.

[subego]

The tollway is the freeway?

[andi*pandi]

That feels like a stand up joke.
We park on the driveway and drive on the parkway!

[subego]

The stretch of toll I take, unambiguously named the Jane Addams Memorial Tollway, is about 25 miles long. Outbound to the burbs is 55¢, inbound to the city is 75¢. No idea how much this is meant to reduce traffic, but it’s usually not too bad. When it’s not rush hour, I commonly go 100.

Everything becomes a horror show the moment the tollway ends, but that’s where O’Hare is.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by subego 

The tollway is the freeway?

It’s the “not free freeway”. I have not explored all of the various tollways in Houston, but the ones I have used are essentially the only controlled access highways along their routes. There are plenty of frontage roads (the most common road name in Texas seems to be “Frontage Road”), but they have traffic-light type intersections and all the other things that make you want to use a freeway instead of a surface street.

[Brien]

We have toll roads in LA, but they require you to have a FastTrak subscription box thingy so I've never used it.

My dad, when he was working, had to drive 1-2 hours every day to places served by the roads, and he loved it, though.