National push for larger lettering on street signs hits snag over costs

FORT COLLINS — A national push to make street signs easier for aging drivers to read has hit a snag over concerns it will further drain city and county transportation budgets.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said last week that requiring cities and counties to change lettering on signs showing street names as well as boosting the size of letters could stretch local budgets.

“There have got to be better ways to improve safety without piling costs onto the American people,” LaHood said.

Colorado street crews have already begun to make the changes. One new requirement calls for changing the lettering on signs showing street names from all capital letters to a capital followed by lowercase letters. Instead of “COLFAX,” for instance, the new signs would read “Colfax.”

The new federal rules also mandate boosting the size of lettering to 6 inches high from 4 inches, and making the letters more reflective.

Studies say bigger and mixed lettering will be more legible for drivers who are nearing or crawling past retirement age.

“It comes down to people who are now in the roads don’t see as well as you used to,” said Joe Olson, traffic engineer for the city of Fort Collins.

But Fort Collins and other cities and counties don’t have much room in their budgets to pay for the changes. Fort Collins sets aside about $60,000 annually to replace about 8,000 street-name signs.

There is little extra in the budget to increase type size and reflectivity. “We just don’t have it in the budget for that,” Olson said. “Maybe the City Council will budget for it, but things are real tight right now.”

All street-name signs must be converted to 6-inch lettering by January 2012. The new reflectivity standard must be reached by January 2015. There is no deadline for switching to upper-and-lower case lettering.

Many cities and counties in Colorado are making the changes as existing signs wear out.

“We are upgrading signs just through regular maintenance, and when the compliance date comes up we might have to do a little extra,” said Lonnie Berett, paved road groups manager for Larimer County, which has more than 10,000 letter signs on nearly 900 miles of roadway.

The cost to replace signs in Milwaukee could reach as high as $1.4 million. And in Iron Mountain, Mich., which has a population of 8,154 and a $6 million budget, the city will have to spend $30 to $50 apiece replacing several hundred signs.

“You’re looking at all the other things you’ve got to cut, and now you’ve got to do this,” said Iron Mountain City Manager Jordan Stanchina.

Complaints such as those prompted LaHood to say he wants to reopen the public comment period on the sign changes, which may push back the deadlines for compliance.

“I believe that is regulation that makes no sense,” LaHood said. “It does not properly take into account the high costs that local governments would have to bear.”

Denver began changing to new lettering and reflectivity standards in the mid-1990s and completed its replacement program for all 500,000 street signs this year, said Daelene Mix, Denver Public Works marketing and communications manager.

“We already exceed federal standards for signage,” Mix said. “We knew this would improve safety standards in the city, and I think we set the bar for other cities.”

Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907

or mwhaley@denverpost.com

The Associated Press contributed to this story