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May 21, 2009

Helpful signs

I just spent the last 18 hours driving around Houston, and even for a car-driving gal like me, I found it a bit daunting. It’s one of those cities where 610 North becomes 610 East becomes 610 South and where you can drive around and around the city without ever actually reaching it.

(And the kind of place where the Sam Houston Tollway is sometimes also known as 8 and sometimes isn’t and sometimes requires you pay a toll and sometimes doesn’t.) It looks something like this.

But there was one thing I liked: when you reached a point where the highway split into two separate roads, the pavement was painted with helpful signs, including the route number. So, for example, when I was traveling east on Route 10, and the left two lanes were heading to 610 North, the signs read, “610 Only” and then a hundred feet later read “This lane 610.”

This little system was extremely helpful, especially when the overhead signs were complicated and traffic was moving fast (as it does around here) and you needed a little reassurance to know that you were heading in the right direction.

It’s not a bad metaphor for communication: Are you giving people the signs they need when they need them most?

Posted by Alison Davis at May 21, 2009 04:55 PM