Signs (wayfinding, etc.) and planning

Christopher points us to a series on signs-signage in Slate Magazine, "The Secret Language of Signs," which has many parts.

In my planning work, be it commercial district revitalization, or now in bicycling, walking, and transit, I am always focused on signage, the need to consider it systemically and to make it a coordinated system, providing not just information about directions and services, but also the opportunity for interpretation (community, historical, cultural) and promotion (developing a brand and identity for bicycling and a bikeway network or for transit through the signage system).

Alexandria is developing an interesting wayfinding signage system focused on the commercial district there and pedestrians, and Good Magazine ran a feature, "Better Bikeways: Turning a City Street Into a Bike Corridor" by Joseph Pritchard on his ideas for a coordinated system of signage for bikeways.

The reason that I am not blogging very much is that the planning study for which I serve as project manager (Western County Pedestrian and Bicycle Access Plan in Baltimore County) is on an incredibly short time line, is understaffed for the area we are covering, and covers more territory than either the entirety of DC or Baltimore City, which means that the amount of stuff that has to be accomplished week in and week out ends up being considerable--meetings with interested people, presentations, presentations for the Advisory Committee, and draft sections of the plan.

The written plan will probably be:

- introduction, history, planning process - 10%
- engineering/facilities/management and operations - 20%
- education, encouragement, enforcement - 20%
- planning, management and coordination, funding, implementation, measurement and evaluation - 20%
- facilities improvements recommendations - 30%

and I have about 40% done at the level of a decent draft (e.g., these sections Part One and Part Two on facilities--but there is a lot missing, I want to take out and expand two subsections which I crammed in other sections due to lost work time during the snowstorms, and add in management and maintenance of facilities into that section, not to mention so much more.).

But the 30% on recommendations is more than 30% of the work. We have to measure the roads and sidewalks and perform calculations on pedestrian level of service and bicycle level of comfort and then prioritize improvements based on the need for right of way and the cost of construction vs. the type of improvement and the cost-benefit.

Not to mention that "I am trying to figure out how to reorganize the government and its system" in order that sustainable transportation can be prioritized rather than be ignored. We'll see how much of those recommendations ("management and coordination") get to stay in the draft, let alone the final draft produced before the inter-agency and public comment review period.

And work to get best practices in, dealing with the realities of extremely tight budgets, a dominant focus on automobility, and push some of the envelope on county and state requirements on complete streets, public facilities siting and walkability, school district planning for walking and bicycling, college campus master planning and sustainable transportation objectives, influencing as much as I can the transportation element of the master plan, not to mention transit network planning in Baltimore City and Baltimore County, and a branding concept for the Baltimore County bikeway network, 5 public meetings across the study area next month, presentations to community groups, etc.

all by June 30th (for the final draft -- then the summer for review and a public meeting in September, and then transmittal to the Planning Board for consideration and approval and then to the County Council for approval + this is an election year and the landscape of elected officials will be changing significantly).

Which means less blogging.