Last month, you may remember, I went out and explored the street signs down my localstreet. I took lots of photos [album here] and I wrote about them in some depth [post here]. I was particularly impressed by the historical diversity of signage on display, with old metal etchings surviving alongside more modern enamel plates. There can't be many roads in London where you can still see as many as 12 different designs of street sign. Well, make that 13! My local council have been busy over the last couple of weeks erecting several new signs of yet another design, and for no particularly obvious reason. In fact I'm starting to suspect that Tower Hamlets has a Pointless Streetsign Erection Committee with more money than sense. Let me show you why, using the police station on the corner of Bow Road and Addington Road as an example.
Until last year there was only one street sign on the wall here, this blue and gold sign dating back to the late 20th century. It's a proper heritage sign with a bit of character, proudly announcing to anyone willing to squint up close that they are standing in "Bow neighbourhood". But the sign had also seen better days. Years of marker pen abuse had taken their toll, and there were also the remains of a particularly stubborn sticker in the centre. Nothing a good scrub by some council operative couldn't shift, but oh no, that doesn't appear to have been an option. The Tower Hamlets Pointless Streetsign Erection Committee must have had a meeting and decided to introduce a completely different design concept, because last year this new sign appeared in front of the police station railings...
The 2005 sign is very white, very basic and rather nondescript. There's just a road name and a postcode, in two dead ordinary colours, with no additional embellishment whatsoever. Something this ordinary can only have been designed to comply with some all-encompassing legislation on accessibility for partially sighted citizens, allowing the Tower Hamlets Pointless Streetsign Erection Committee to fill in their Fully Diversity Compliant tickbox. But what the council forgot to do was take down the old sign on the same wall. There were suddenly two completely different street signs signs here... and exactly the same on the the opposite side of the road... and exactly the same at several other road junctions around the Bow area. Everywhere one new-style sign on posts, and one old-style sign on the wall. There's true diversity for you. Until very recently, when this new sign appeared as well...
This is an example of the Tower Hamlets Pointless Streetsign Erection Committee's 2006 design. Again it has black writing on a white background with a red postcode, although the black font is lighter and fussier, and the red font is smaller and less distinct. This is so that an extra, crucial piece of information can be squeezed onto each new sign. It's now essential that we be told that this road is in the borough of Tower Hamlets... and not just any old borough of Tower Hamlets but the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. How very useful. And did the council remove both of the old signs before they put this new one up? Did they hell, they only removed the old one with a bit of character and left the bland year-old sign standing. So now we have two virtually-identical street signs on the same wall... and exactly the same on the opposite side of the road... and exactly the same at several other road junctions around the Bow area. Everywhere one new-style sign on posts, and one near-duplicate even-newer sign on the wall. Unless the old street sign was too high up on the wall, that is, in which case the council have left it in place because nobody could be arsed to remove it. In some places, for example at the end of Tomlins Grove, there are now as many as four different street signs visible on the same wall. This isn't coherent heritage retention, it's a total mess.
My local street is now wholly over-signed, and for no particularly obvious reason. I hate to think how much this pointless double replacement exercise has cost me and my neighbours, the local taxpayers. Perhaps if any members of the Tower Hamlets Pointless Streetsign Erection Committee are reading this, they could leave me a reply.
