Show me the street signs of your city

[Kilgore Trout]

Originally Posted by harls

Ottawa's logo looks like a maple leaf getting sucked into a black hole.

Sounds like a good metaphor for Ottawa.

[SkeggsEggs]

Kanata had two varieties (i think) of signs before being overtaken by the lame City of Ottawa street signs. Everything about our citys branding from logo, to street signs, to park signs feels depressingly corporate to me.

A lot of the older suburban local streets have a rectangular box on a pole with black letters on a white background. They tend to leave these up while adding the new signs to street lights.

https://www.google.com/maps/@45.3065...7i13312!8i6656

Then they had this sign with the city logo which I like. They are less busy than the City of Ottawa sign, and according to the examples in this thread have a unique colour scheme! There are not many left now.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by harls

Ottawa's logo looks like a maple leaf getting sucked into a black hole.

Originally Posted by Kilgore Trout

Sounds like a good metaphor for Ottawa.

[vid]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Bravo! to the city crew that installed the Donald St. sign!

It's actually a pretty strange set-up, they've put signs with text on both sides onto one side of square light poles. The opposite side of the street has no street signs at all. Thunder Bay has incredibly inconsistent sign positioning.

There are two on-building street signs I know of in Thunder Bay:


https://www.flickr.com/photos/vidioman/4507979817/

John Street was renamed McKellar Street in the 1970s, and Myles Street had its spelling changed to Miles at some unknown point in time. This house was renovated about 5 years ago and the people doing it removed the signs.

The last one remaining (I haven't been there in a while but I doubt it has been removed) is on a building in Downtown Port Arthur, and only labels the cross-street:


https://www.flickr.com/photos/vidioman/16205629804/

It dates to probably the late 1940s, when St. Paul Street was configured as a transit platform for the city's trolley bus network. It was replaced in the late 1970s by a new terminal a few blocks away.

[SignalHillHiker]

Took a few shots of the different kinds, one of which I forgot about.

99.9% are this:



These are the ones I forgot about. The utilities are buried along Water Street but on all the others downtown there are still poles and they generally have these signs, which appear to be abandoned and not replaced as they fail.



And then some areas get big elaborate signs.

[yaletown_fella]

Controversial opinion but I think the generic green street and highway signs look a lot better than the newer ones which are often a white font on blue background.

[AuxTown]

Originally Posted by harls

Ottawa's logo looks like a maple leaf getting sucked into a black hole.

Also this:

[AuxTown]

The signs in downtown Ottawa around all of the tourists destinations have a distinctive look:



photo from: http://www.montrealgazette.com/Welli...799/story.html

[Andy6]

Is there a plot afoot to gradually replace the too-British name of Wellington Street with "Confederation Boulevard"?

[Blitz]

All of the street signs at signalized intersections in Windsor have been slowly replaced over the last 2 years as they have been changed from Helvetica font to Highway Gothic font. Here is the new look:



Here is the old look:



The local CBC station did a story about the change and in their article are pictures and a video showing how they actually make the signs:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/winds...over-1.4511316


The next project is to replace the signs at non-signalized intersections. The old ones are in Helvetica font and lack the suffix but the new ones are in Highway Gothic font and include the suffix.

Here is an intersection with a new one (in the foreground) and an old one (in the background).



I'm pretty sure Windsor is the only city in Ontario where address numbers go up by 100 for each block (modelled after Detroit's address system).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Andy6

Is there a plot afoot to gradually replace the too-British name of Wellington Street with "Confederation Boulevard"?

Not that I have ever heard. Also, those signs pictured in the post above yours belong to the National Capital Commission, AFAIK. They are not City of Ottawa signs.

Confederation Boulevard is a secondary name. No buildings have a Confederation Blvd. address.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Blitz

All of the street signs at signalized intersections in Windsor have been slowly replaced over the last 2 years as they have been changed from Helvetica font to Highway Gothic font. Here is the new look:



Here is the old look:



The local CBC station did a story about the change and in their article are pictures and a video showing how they actually make the signs:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/winds...over-1.4511316


The next project is to replace the signs at non-signalized intersections. The old ones are in Helvetica font and lack the suffix but the new ones are in Highway Gothic font and include the suffix.

Here is an intersection with a new one (in the foreground) and an old one (in the background).



I'm pretty sure Windsor is the only city in Ontario where address numbers go up by 100 for each block (modelled after Detroit's address system).

It's rare but I have noticed some cities don't put the suffix (or generic) if it's a "Street", because that's kind of understood I guess. They will only put it if it's something else, like "Road", "Avenue", etc.

Phone books used to be like that too, back when we had them.

[SkeggsEggs]

Originally Posted by Andy6

Is there a plot afoot to gradually replace the too-British name of Wellington Street with "Confederation Boulevard"?

Confederation Boulevard is a symbolic name for a handful of streets in downtown Ottawa and Gatineau that are home a number of national institutions, monuments, and museums. As Acajack said it is done by the NCC.

Parliament, Supreme Court, Rideau Hall, Museum of Civilization, War museum, the Royal Mint, and etc.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by SkeggsEggs

Confederation Boulevard is a symbolic name for a handful of streets in downtown Ottawa and Gatineau that are home a number of national institutions, monuments, and museums. As Acajack said it is done by the NCC.

Parliament, Supreme Court, Rideau Hall, Museum of Civilization, War museum, the Royal Mint, and etc.

You are right about that. Here's a link straight from the NCC:

https://ncc-ccn.gc.ca/places/confederation-boulevard

[Loco101]

I also have to add that the Ville de Gatineau has altered a number of the NCC signs by not having an English street designation. (I'm assuming it's the city that did it) Road signage falls under provincial and municipal rules and it's not on federal property so it's totally permitted. In Quebec, only French street designations are considered to be official. And Gatineau is not a designated bilingual city so signs much be in French only. Ottawa is supposed to be an officially bilingual city so it has street designations in both languages. Ontario allows street signage to be bilingual.

Here is an example: https://goo.gl/maps/3wA1g5txwo35azwt8

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Loco101

I also have to add that the Ville de Gatineau has altered a number of the NCC signs by not having an English street designation. (I'm assuming it's the city that did it) Road signage falls under provincial and municipal rules and it's not on federal property so it's totally permitted. In Quebec, only French street designations are considered to be official. And Gatineau is not a designated bilingual city so signs much be in French only. Ottawa is supposed to be an officially bilingual city so it has street designations in both languages. Ontario allows street signage to be bilingual.

Here is an example: https://goo.gl/maps/3wA1g5txwo35azwt8

It's very strange that they get to do this, or would even want to do this, at the same time as the city benefits massively from federal jobs and employment. I suppose it's some sort of requirement from the government of Quebec.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by Andy6

It's very strange that they get to do this, or would even want to do this, at the same time as the city benefits massively from federal jobs and employment. I suppose it's some sort of requirement from the government of Quebec.

Yes, it is because of the Quebec government. It has controls over municipal signage and street names. Only designated bilingual municipalities can have bilingual signs. There are some rare exceptions where the street signs can be only in English for historical reasons.

Family of mine had a cottage on a fairly large lake in the Gatineau hills. The road names around the lake used to use letters and numbers. But it was confusing for emergency vehicles when they had calls. So the municipality was told by the province that the roads should be named. My relatives along with others on their road were told to come up with a name for the road. They made up a name with a combination of the first letters of the family names along that road. But it wasn't the municipality that approved it, the name had to be submitted to the toponymy commission (Commission de toponymie du Québec) in Quebec City where it would be reviewed. It was approved and the municipality immediately put up street signs with the new name.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Andy6

It's very strange that they get to do this, or would even want to do this, at the same time as the city benefits massively from federal jobs and employment. I suppose it's some sort of requirement from the government of Quebec.

There is no requirement to allow for an increased presence of English on a municipal level in order to get federal jobs in your city. No more than there is requirement to allow for more French.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Loco101

I also have to add that the Ville de Gatineau has altered a number of the NCC signs by not having an English street designation. (I'm assuming it's the city that did it) Road signage falls under provincial and municipal rules and it's not on federal property so it's totally permitted. In Quebec, only French street designations are considered to be official. And Gatineau is not a designated bilingual city so signs much be in French only. Ottawa is supposed to be an officially bilingual city so it has street designations in both languages. Ontario allows street signage to be bilingual.

Here is an example: https://goo.gl/maps/3wA1g5txwo35azwt8

I highly doubt that Gatineau unilaterally changed the NCC's signs. They most certainly worked that through together.

When it was the old city of Hull the NCC's Confederation Boulevard signs also said "rue Laurier" only.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Andy6

It's very strange that they get to do this, or would even want to do this, at the same time as the city benefits massively from federal jobs and employment. I suppose it's some sort of requirement from the government of Quebec.

What's strange? They can do it and benefit massively from federal jobs and employment. Seems pretty straightforward ....