Richmond Magazine: Gimme Little Sign

My feature article on the City of Richmond's "waysigning" program is now up on Richmond magazine's web site:

Bill Martin is looking for signs. 

“We have all of these rich cultural attractions, and no one can find them,” the director of the Valentine Richmond History Center says, a little exasperated, as he drives around town.

Martin, along with other museum directors and cultural stakeholders, has been working with the city — pleading, actually — to implement a long-burning plan to update Richmond’s road signage, which would better direct visitors to attractions such as the Valentine, the Virginia Historical Society, the Landmark Theater, Maymont and many others. And it would appear that, starting this month, there will finally be movement on the issue, coincidentally timed with a $21 million, federally funded overhaul of the city’s traffic-light system.

As it stands now, confusion reigns. Cruising along in his Ford Focus, Martin notes a group of people standing near the Convention Center, all of them looking with crinkled eyebrows at a large map. “You see that around here all the time,” he says. “They look lost. Once you get there, to the attraction, you are fine, there are signs, but it’s the getting there.”

Click here to get the rest of the story.

For your beach reading pleasure, you can also find "Gimme Little Sign" in the print edition of the publication's 25th Annual Best & Worst issue, available on newsstands and finer beach towels right now. (Illustration by the mighty David Busby.)