Future scenario

Nowadays wayfinding systems and signage have highly evolved in a way that noone could ever imagine. New technologies were developed and are developing in order to make exterior information much more easier to read and follow.

Road signage and driving is also affected, in a way that makes drivers’ lives more relaxed. But we have not reached not even the middle of the barrel called innovation yet.  

Why not have computer-driven cars where we tell the computer where we want to go to, let it work out the best combination of roads and drive us there in a proper manner while we can do other things? The technology for computers to control cars exists. The trouble is that road signage is designed for people not computers. Computers can remember better than people, can respond to communications more consistently and do not have feelings, but computers cannot see or hear like people. Sensors in automobiles can detect if there is anything behind a reversing car, or if the braking lights on a vehicle ahead go on, but as yet computers cannot read road signs and street names or understand what to do and where to go. The complexities of down town traffic are far beyond any existing computer-based systems of driving.

However, what computers can do is respond to radio signals that are not affected by wheather. If the computer-driven cars is a good scenario for the near future then a new kind of signage system that computers can read should and has to be developed.

Such a system could communicate messages with a correct use of screen projection with information about the road that the driver is crossing might be very helpful for him/her and for the passengers too. Several infos, such as weather conditions, speed limit, dangerous turns and even traffic condition ahead would make the next generation of drivers very careful and aware just because will help them to focus on the road with distracting their attention. It could also transmit individual messages to the car’s occupants giving them the ability to touch the screen and manipulate informations, like maps and navigate in a 3D virtual enviroment. 

Variable message signs (VMS), were developed, quite innovative, according to the needs of the driver. They are often placed along big motorways and ring roads in order to indicate speed limits as well as road conditions ahead. The driver still looks through the car window to read these signs. They are not linked into displays on the screen within the vehicle. They can be obscured by other vehicles, or misunderstood in foggy conditions. 

Everything leads in a dual system, like that in aviation. Such a dual system could help a computer-driven car and it’s occupants to decode the signs of the road with signals that let the car know what road to follow, what is the speed limit in this particular area and also does not leave the driver and the other people in the car uninvolved. It is a helpful suggestion that does not replace the road signage just because, even if an intelligent system could be totally responsible for the driving, the human factor will always play the most important role in the transportations.

However, there are many factors that can affect the future of road signage and the way that it is going to evovle.

First of all, even though, we are not far from a dual system like the one mentioned before, the trends that are going to exist in that particular moments in the future are quite difficult to define. The use of an existing typeface in a virtual enviroment like the Head Up Display is, probably,  not going to take place. Inevitably new fonts will be developed having better results and behavior on a vehicle’s screen. Legibility is the most important factor in the relationship between the vehicle’s occupants and the vehicle’s screen. The informations should and have to be clear in order to be read without distructing the driver’s attention.

It is also important to think of the weather conditions that may occur during a trip. In the middle of a rainy situation the screen will react depending on the intensity of the rain. Words and numenrs are going to have bigger size and be brighter in order to stand out.

In terms of colour, should always be adjusted itself according to the eather conditions and the light that exists

Innovative technologies

Flexible screen technologies

The original challenges for car windscreens were clear vision and protection against the weather . Today, they do much more than that. For example, Anti-Theft Glass has been developed to protect against crime. And the Head-Up Display provides the option of projecting important information as a virtual image in front of the windscreen and thus in the field of vision of the driver. Technologies which not only improve driver comfort, but also driver safety.

Every car driver is confronted with a wide variety of stimuli which can distract his attention from the traffic while he is driving: whether he is switching radio station, chatting with the passenger or just looking at the dashboard. For example, the average driver needs one second to check his speed, at 30 mph he is covering 50 ft in this second.

So the automotive industry is constantly working on minimising this distraction by designing the controls of the vehicle accordingly. The Head-Up Display (HUD) is a promising development. This involves projecting information onto the windscreen, direct in the driver’s field of vision, so he doesn’t need to move his head down or avert his eyes from the road. Initially, BMW fitted the HUD into prototype vehicles and a variant was tested in Formula1, where a miniature display was integrated into the helmet so the image could be projected against the visor. However, the roots of this technology are in aviation. In aircraft, Head-Up Displays of these kinds have been helping fighter pilots for decades and were used in display technology in civil aviation for a good 15 years now.

When it came to the development of an application for production use in cars, BMW cooperated with the automotive supplier Siemens VDO and the technology is already available as a special option for the 5 and 6 Series. The HUD works on the following principle: The vehicle’s dashboard includes a projection unit consisting of a TFT screen, a light source and several mirrors. Light is passed through the screen, deflected by the mirror and projected against the windscreen. At a size of around 18 x 9 cm, the virtual image is optically perceived at the optimum ergonomic distance, hovering at about 2 m above the bonnet. So the driver neither has to divert his eyes from the road to get important information nor adjust his eyes when switching between close and distant objects and vice versa. Compared to conventional display systems, the HUD reduces the time take to absorb the information by nearly a half: “We can display various values and information, such as the speed,” Gunnar Franz from the BMW Group describes the display. “Depending on the configuration, it is also possible to display navigation instructions or other vehicle information, such as active cruise control or check control warning messages. It makes no difference what the weather conditions are. Whether you’re driving through rain, fog, darkness or direct sunshine, a light-sensitive sensor adjusts the brightness of the image to the environment. This automatic brightness adjustment by the HUD means it is no longer necessary for the eyes to adjust to the difference in brightness between the road and the interior of the vehicle. And this by no means exhausts the potential of the Head-Up Display.

Problems to overcome

(1) It is not 100% sure that communication takes place between the sign and the vehicle, (2) nor any way to stop signs sending their messages once they have been received. (3) Nor is there any way to change the messages they send unless they are variable message signs (VMS) as found on some motorways. Day and night, year after year, whether there is anyone to see them or not, road signs are out there endlessly transmitting the same messages. 

Pictograms by Otl Aicher

In 1966, at a special session on intermational signs and symbols in trasport and tourism, the Icograda set out the following requirements:Symbols needed to de unambiguous, mean the same thing to all people, be read quickly, and acted upon easily. The central problem was that among international organizations, and even at a national level, separate and conflicting work on sign systems existed or was in progress. Icograda had collected information about a number of signage systems either already in use or in preparation for public events, air travel, and surface transport.

Aicher had first become aware of the advantage of an internationally comprehensible pictorial language when he visited Japan in 1960. There he experienced fist-hand the limitations of a national written language in communicating to foreigners. When Aicher was commissioned to develop both the signage system for the franfurt Airport ad the pictogramsfor the Munich Olympics, he saw the chance to move a step forwardfrom Masaru Katsumi’s visual sign language for the Tokyo games. His goal was to expand and standarize this pictorial language, giving it a grammar that would enable it to create messages.

Aicher’s Frankurt Airport sign system was installed in 1971. According to international standards, the signs for air travel were aimed to ease visual communication and the introduction of a color-coding system. Initially ninety-five signs and arrows were introduced by Aicher at Frankfurt. The introductory text of the brochure Piktogramme (1971) gives the impression that the signs were based on international standards adopted by the German Airports Association, yet Aicher’s design differed from their specifications in purpose, use of color, and shape pf the signboards.

The importance of the enviromental design

Environmental communication systems help us to make decisions when navigating the built environment. These decisions include understanding the organization of space, knowing one’s location, and learning how to find one’s destination. A signage system that is readable and legible by all users is a fundamental part of environmental communications. In 1997, the US Census Bureau reported that 3.7% of U.S. citizens (7.7 million people) over 15 years of age “had difficulty seeing words/letters” and that “6.6 million people were unable to read printed signs at normal viewing distances.” This statistic jumps to 12.1% for individuals 65 years of age and older. The World Health Organization (2002) reported that worldwide there are approximately 180 million persons with vision disabilities. Signage systems that are designed without taking into account this significant portion of the population leave people “lost in space.”

To date, limited empirical data exists to determine the ideal characteristics for legibility and readability of large format displays like those typically used in buildings and on sites. Many studies have evaluated the legibility of text in small print. Also, a large body of knowledge exists around the legibility of text on standard highway signs. Text size and font type relating to visual acuity have also been studied extensively. We know that a specific font, Sne len is most legible when measuring visual acuity (Garvey, Zineddin and Pietrucha, 2001). But, these findings have limited relevance in the built environment because sign reading and acuity chart reading are very different for two basic reasons. Vision charts are always presented with high contrast whereas signs in the built environment may not be. Acuity charts do not use words, sentences and phrases like those on signs. Finally, while accessibility standards have established guidelines for signs, they are consensus based rather than evidence based. Recent studies contradict many of these guidelines. A summary of the most recent findings is provided below.

Johnston Typeface

Johnston (or Johnston Sans) is a very good example of a typeface that is used in exterior and interior signage and wayfinding systems. It is a humanist sans-serif typeface designed by and named after Edward Johnston. It is well known for its use by Transport for London. Johnston’s former student Eric Gill also worked on the development of the typeface, which was later to influence his own Gill Sans typeface, produced 1928–32.

Features

Features of the font are the perfect circle of the letter O and the use of a diagonal square dot above minuscule letters i and j and for the full stop. Commas, apostrophes and other punctuation marks are also based on the diagonal square dot. The capitals of the typeface are based on Roman square capitals, and the lower-case on the humanistic minuscule, the handwriting in use in Italy in the fifteenth century. In this, it marked a break with the kinds of sans serif previously used, sometimes known as grotesque, which tended to have squarer shapes.

History

The typeface was commissioned in 1913 by Frank Pick, Commercial Manager of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (also known as ‘The Underground Group’), as part of his plan to strengthen the company’s corporate identity, and introduced in 1916. Pick specified to Johnston that he wanted a typeface that would ensure that the Underground Group’s posters would not be mistaken for advertisements; it should have “the bold simplicity of the authentic lettering of the finest periods” and belong “unmistakably to the twentieth century”. In 1933, The Underground Group was absorbed by the London Passenger Transport Board and the typeface was adopted as part of the London Transport brand. The font family was originally called Underground. It became known as Johnston’s Railway Type, and later simply Johnston. It comes with two weights, heavy and ordinary. Heavy does not contain lower-case letters.

New Johnston

The Johnston typeface was redesigned in 1979 by Eiichi Kono at Banks & Miles to produce New Johnston, the variant of the original typeface currently used by London Underground. The new typeface is slightly heavier or bolder than the original. The new family comes with Bold, Medium, Light weights. The new typeface replaced the old typeface.

Johnston Delf Smith

A further change occurred in 2008 when Transport for London removed the serif from the numeral ‘1’ and also altered the ‘4’, in both cases reverting these to their original appearance. The petit-serif variation of the font, as seen at Sudbury Town tube station

The original font was developed in the 1920s by Percy Delf Smith (another former pupil of Edward Johnston). It was commissioned by Frank Pick of London Underground as a petit-serif variation of the organisation’s standard sans-serif Johnston face. The typeface was originally used for the headquarters building at 55 Broadway, SW1. It can still be seen on some signs at Sudbury Town and Arnos Grove on the Piccadilly line.

In early 2007, an electronic version of the typeface was developed under the name Johnston Delf Smith, specifically for use on historic signs.

ITC Johnston

International Typeface Corporation released a variant in 1999 called ITC Johnston, produced by British type designers Richard Dawson and Dave Farey. It originally included three font weights like New Johnston. However, it does not include the hooked 1 and uses side-pointed 4.

In November 2002, the typeface was rereleased in OpenType format, which also expanded the font family to include italic fonts in all weights. Character set was expanded to support ISO Adobe 2 character set. OpenType features include alternates, case forms, small caps (romans only), old style figure. Separate small caps (romans only) and old style figure faces were also released for each weight in TrueType and PostScript formats, for a total of fifteen typefaces.

ITC Johnston Pro

Released in March 2009, this version inclu-des support of Adobe CE character set.

In 1997, London Transport Museum licensed the original Johnston typeface exclusively to P22 Type Foundry, available commercially as Johnston Underground. Johnston Underground included Regular, Bold, and Extras weights, with the Extra containing only ornamental symbols.

Underground Pro

P22 later had Paul Hunt add to their version of the Underground typeface to create the Underground Pro (or P22 Underground Pro) family. The full Underground Pro Set contains nineteen Pro OpenType fonts and 58 Basic OpenType fonts, covering extended Latin, Greek, Cyrillic character sets. Weights are expanded to six: Thin, Light, Book, Medium, Demi, Heavy. However, there are no italic styles in P22’s designs. Underground, Underground CY, Underground GR support extended Latin, Cyrillic, Greek characters respectively. The Latin sub-family contains medium weight Titling fonts, which feature underscored and/or overscored Latin small letters. Pro fonts include extensive OpenType features, including eleven stylistic sets: Petite Capitals, Dryad Cap Alternates, Humanistic Alternates 1, Humanistic Alternates 2, Geometric Alternates, Round Points, Diamond Points, Alternate Tilde, All Under commas, All cedillas, Alternate Eng.

Usages

Its use has included the Tube map, nameplates and general station signing, as well as much of the printed material issued by the Underground Group and its successors; also by the nationalised British Road Services in the immediate post-war era.

List of thypefaces used for signage worldwide

ANWB Cc – condensed road typeface used in the Netherlands, based on FHWA Series C. It is used mainly on finger   posts

ANWB Dd – slightly condensed road typeface used in the Netherlands, which has been introduced in 2010

ANWB Ee – commonly used road typeface in the Netherlands, based on FHWH Series E(M)

ANWB Uu – new road typeface used in the Netherlands, designed by Gerard Unger

Austria – road typeface used in Austria

Brunel – created on behalf of Railtrack for use in British railway stations by David Quay, Freda Sack, also in use on Delhi Metro

Brusseline – developed for Brussels’ public transport company

Calvert – developed for the Tyne and Wear Metro by Margaret Calvert

Carretera – developed for the General Directorate of Highways in Turkey

Casey – developed by the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation for its own use

Clearview – developed to replace U.S. Federal Highway Administration typefaces

DIN 1451 – the German transport typeface

Drogowskaz – the Polish transport typeface

Esseltub – earlier used in Stockholm Metro

FIP signage typeface - a modified version of Helvetica Medium used by the Government of Canada

FF Meta – used in Stockholm Metro

Frutiger – used on Swiss road signs, across the public transport network of Oslo, Norway, by the Dutch National Railways, BAA Airports in the UK, and in UK’s National Health Service

FHWA Series fonts – sometimes called Highway Gothic. Developed for U.S. road signage, and also used in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, and New Zealand

Futura BSK – used by Italian railways

Gill Sans – used by British Railways until 1965

Helvetica – used in the New York City Subway system, the Chicago Transit Authority system, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority system, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority system, and in the Madrid Metro; formerly used in Hong Kong’s MTR and Stockholm Metro

Helvetica Neue – used for road signs in Hong Kong

Johnston – used by Transport for London

LTA Identity Typeface - used by Singapore’s Mass Rapid Transit

Metrolis – custom designed font for the 1995 rebranding of Metropolitano de Lisboa, designed by the Foundry 

Motorway – used for motorway route numbers in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland

Myriad – used on Hong Kong’s Mass Transit Railway

NPS Rawlinson – used by the United States National Park Service

Parisine – used in the Paris Métro

Pragmatica – used in the Saint Petersburg Metro since 2002; currently is being replaced by Freeset, Cyrillic variation of Frutiger

Rail Alphabet – designed for British Rail in 1964 and still in use on parts of the UK rail network. Rail Alphabet is also still in use across the Danish rail network and its principle operator, DSB.

Rotis Semi Sans – used by its own creator, Otl Aicher, for the Metro Bilbao corporate design.

Rotis Serif – used on road signposts in Singapore.

Sispos and Sisneg by Bo Berndal – old Swedish standard (SIS 030011, 1973) for public road signs, displays, etc.

Toronto Subway Font – used by the Toronto Transit Commission in maps, publications, and stations of the Toronto Subway & RT

Trafikkalfabetet (“The traffic alphabet”) – used for Norwegian road signs and license plates until 2002

Transport – developed for the British roads, used in Italy, Portugal, Greece and other countries

Tratex – used for road signs in Sweden

Univers – used by the Montreal Metro, San Francisco’s Bay Area Rapid Transit, Frankfurt Airport and the Walt Disney World Resort road system

Vejtavleskrift (“Road sign typeface”) – used for road signs in Denmark

History of signage

Signs have been around since human beings first began expressing themselves by drawing in caves. Whilst most of these images were probably ritualistic or spiritual in nature symbolism has become a huge part of human communication,

The word sign derives from the ancient Latin ‘signum’ which meant mark or token but it was the Romans (who else) that first recognised the usefulness of signs and adopted the first road-sign system where columns etched with Roman numerals sat on the roadside to indicate direction and distances.

Signs developed throughout civilisations as an important part of communicating, merchants soon discovered the use of carvings, bright paint, ornamental iron and even gilding encouraged would draw in more customers than there competition but it wasn’t until the industrial revolution and the development of motor cars did signage become essential for our safety in allowing us to safely go about our business.

 The use of signs for promotional purposes has always been around with shopkeepers ensuring their name was above the door of their business, however in 1929 when a car salesman in the US ordered the first neon signs, a new revolution in signage began. People came from all over America to see the ‘dancing fire’ and following the success the use of neon lights soon spread across the continent and the rest of the world.

More developments such as LED lighting were developed. This allowed for the fist time signs that could carry different messages such as ‘road open’ or ‘road closed’ and became an extremely valuable tool in road safety.

Now another revolution in signage is beginning thanks to the plummeting costs of LCD and plasma TV technology. Now digital signage using LCD and plasmas is spreading with more and more uses for this new digital signage being exploited everyday.

We are now even seeing the growth of outdoor digital signage made possible due largely to the waterproof LCD and LCD enclosures available to protect the devices. If current trend continues then it is quite possible that previous signage innovations such as neon and LED will soon be replaced by digital signage.

An explanation according to Spiekermann :

Here are some key tips to make wayfinding signs more understandable 

“The arrows should be placed always at the same side that they are pointing out, to allow information to flow.

The arrows should be always pointed out UP, when depicting straight direction.

The arrows should never be pointed out DOWN, because it is not clear if that means straight direction or going to a different/lower level.”

These tips seem to be pretty obvious, however some not-following-these-tips examples can be found around the world, in quite new airport terminals or bus stations. Here are some examples that shows the importance of Spiekermann’s words.

Design Process

Tasks and actions of the design process can be grouped in two main stages, according to their purposes and objectives: thinking and executing. Thinking stages refer to the tasks and actions of the design process, which translate (extract meaning) information into understandable data for designers by analysing and understanding the problem to be solved. While executing stages refer to the tasks and actions of the design process which convert information into visual language for communication by taking decisions and actions based on the analysis conducted in the decoding stages. Once thinking stages have been passed through, and content has been analysed, organised and classified, and key data to be visualised has been identified, executing stages consist of visually encoding that data. Even though there was an appropriate analysis of content during thinking stages, when aesthetic principles are not properly followed, the visual translation process can be misled, creating confusing messages, and ineffective outcomes.

The categories of signs

A wayfinding system links different people together, even if they do not share a common language or destination, by guiding all of them through the same space with a single system of communication. The unifying language of a wayfinding system creates a public narrative of how people witness, read, and experience a space. Each sign in a system, each separative voice, serves a particular function and displays a specific kind of content called a message, which might include nonverbal graphic symbols, images, and works.

The narrative is the voice of the building and that of its owner, revealing the pathways and destinations of the building or space, the rules that govern how to use it, and essential information about activities happening within, it is the job of the wayfinding designer to weave these voices together into a single eloquent statement as people navigate the space.

Most wayfinding systems can be broken down into several categories of signs: identification, directional, orientation, and regulatory. This section will explore the variety of signs used in wayfinding design and how they can accentuate impressions about a place.  

The building blocks of wayfinding, identification signs often provide the first impression of a destination. These signs are visual markers that display the name and function of a place or space, whether it is a room, an individual building, or a campus gateway. They appear at the beginning and end of routes and indicate entrances and exits to primary and secondary destinations.

Why people need wayfinding systems?

Succesful wayfinding design depends on understanding three variables : the nature of the client organization, the people with whom the organization communicates, and the type of enviroment in which the system will be installed. It is important to research and define all three of these variables clearly at the outset of a project. In developing the wayfinding strategy and designing the sign system, the designr will have to create a family of sign types that not only addresses primary information and wayfinding needs but also recognizes secondary issues and audiences with an appropriate information hierarchy and sign-messaging protocols. 

The wayfinding requirements of a municipal client must often address different user groups in various settings. The institution iteracts with a diverse community-locals and tourists-all coming to visit city centers, city parks, or other public spaces. In addition, the enviromental graphics need to attract commercial developers in urban-development opportunities.

A corporate client, for example, may need to complete interior signage for a new office building to obtain a legal certificate of occupancy and set up the building for tenants. That same corporation may also wish to use branded sigange to advertise and attract customers, or to signal a change of corporate ownership by rebranding signage at multiple branch locations. Other private institutions have their own particular signage specifications. In the case of a hospital, for instance, the facilities department may issue a Request fo Proposal for wayfinding signage to connect a new building to a larger campus. In their view the primary audience for the signage consists of the patients and visitors who need to find physicians, tratment centers, and other destinations quickly. Secondary audiences include internal groups like doctors, nursing staff, and maintenance and service people.

As in most multidepartmental organizations, the hospital sign system affects many departments and personnel. For example, the development office may be obligated to name the new building after a major donor. The architect of the new building will be concerned that signage is integrated effectively with the architectural design intent. The communications department may decide to use the opportunity to roll out a new institutional identity. Operators of the hospital cafeteria or gift shop may have requirements or even lease agreements that need to be considered regarding the scope of their signage. An effective wayfinding programm can easily balance the needs of the different constituencies, supporting and enabling a positive experience.