by Kevin Burton
They guide, they inform, they update and welcome. They ease the monotony.
At once neutral and friendly, they are ubiquitous comforting company on the road.
And they are green, always green, always the same shade of green.
I’m talking about the signs along American highways. I love the road and just about everything about being on the road. Yesterday we started our Coast to Coast rock and roll road trip. You wouldn’t want a road trip without the tunes, but without the signs, you couldn’t manage at all.
. “Need to know where to exit? Look for the green sign. Need to know how many miles to your destination? Look for the green sign,” reads a passage on the website of the Arizona Department of Transportation. “Want to know what highway you’re on? There’s a green sign. Need to find out your mile marker? Well, the green sign will tell you.”
“You see them every day, more likely multiple times a day. So, why are highway signs green?”
“Green signs are guide signs,” ADOT explains, “and green is considered a ‘cool’ color. It’s not distracting and generally won’t surprise the driver upon seeing it. It blends in enough to be considered part of the scenery, but sticks out enough to notice when you need it.”
“The white typeface on those green signs is the perfect contrast for night driving. In fact, that color combination actually makes the letters appear larger and easier to read.”
“There are some specific reasons for some highway signs being colored green, as opposed to any other color. It has nothing to do with the green of nature or for any other object typically colored green, but instead has much more to do with a driver’s mood and state of alertness,” reads a passage on newswatchtv.com
“A great deal of thought has gone into the process of matching colors to the information contained on specific road signs, so as to be of maximum value to drivers, and to coincide with the importance of the information contained,” newswatch reported.
“For instance, a red stop sign is colored red because it is intended to quickly get the driver’s attention, and because an intersection is just up ahead so it will be necessary to come to a complete halt. The cooler colors, green, blue, and brown, do not contain information considered to have the same urgency as a stop sign, and are more informative in nature. Rather than grabbing the driver’s attention quickly, the coloring of these signs is meant to simply inform the driver of some traffic situation of interest.”
“The green coloring on highway exit signs and directional signs will always be used when it’s simply necessary to inform the driver about an upcoming convenience,” newswatch wrote.
“Another popular usage of green signs are the State Shields which designate business loops or business areas, and are associated with the State Highway having the same number.”
“For instance, a green and white business loop sign showing the number 75 on it, would be associated with State Highway 75, but would direct the driver toward the business section of an area. This will provide access to area businesses along that same route, so that the businesses themselves would not be bypassed by the State Highway, and lose money from all the motorists who bypass the entire area on the highway.”
Newswatch and other sites reported that this highway sign order, emerged from earlier chaos.
“The specific usage for green traffic control signs, and in fact for all colorations of traffic control signs on today’s roadways, has been in place since the adoption of the Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices in 1971. Several versions of the same manual were introduced as far back as 1935, with greater standardization and more improvements coming with each version.”
For the most part, changes to the manual have been brought about as a result of improving technology, and a desire to convey more useful information to vehicle operators. This in turn, has helped to make motorists safer on the nation’s roadways.”
“It was recognized early in the 20th century that some sort of standardization like this would be necessary, because roadway signage up to that point was fairly chaotic. Prior to the adoption of a national standard, various private road clubs would implement their own road signs, but it was more for the benefit of promoting the highway itself than to make it safer for motorists,” newswatch wrote.
“Nowadays, standardization has helped keep the meaning and the appearance of traffic control devices uniform throughout all states of this country.”
Page 7 