Posted on 10/01/2010 9:33:20 AM PDT by Mobile Vulgus
So you are a busy federal agency with lots and lots to do. You have roads to build, bridges to reinforce, and infrastructure to shore up, but there is something gnawing at your paper pushing soul. It's those darn street signs in New York City and others. So, like a good, jackbooted government automaton, you storm down to that offending city and demand it spend $27million to change the lettering on those darn signs. I mean it's not like you have anything else to do, right?
Well, it may seem like a joke but this is precisely what has happened. The Federal Highway Administration has demanded that New York City and other cities change street signs from all upper case to upper and lower (i.e. BROADWAY to Broadway) and it is going to cost an estimated $27 million of the taxpayer’s money to do it in New York City alone.
The city reports that 11,000 signs will have been changed by the end of this fiscal year and the rest will be done by 2018.
So why is this waste of money being forced on the nation from our masters in Washington? Because the federal government has changed its street sign regulations. In all its brilliance, this federal agency has determined that all caps signs are harder to read and might cause accidents as drivers take too long to read signs while driving...
Who publishes the MUTSET? Washington? Or some professional body with too much time on its hands and no responsibility for outcomes?
“The next Republican president desperately needs to put people in charge of these agencies whose job is to 1) repeal tens of thousands of stupid, wealth stealing, job choking regulations, and 2) fire everyone in them and shut them down.”
Oh, I’m pretty sure Republicans contributed to the mess in the first place.
Except that this move was NOT approved by the cities. Many states objected to this change yet the feds are forcing it anyway.
Of course they are.
The DOT publishes it after a majority of the states approve it. Street signs don’t last that long. It won’t cost that much.
No city has ever approved anything.
It is high time that we terminated the cruds that waste $killions on stupid things like this - I can hardly read the signs in upper case, let alone lower - what the hell are these jerks doing?
It is just fiat government control. I agree we need to d eliminate federal powers.
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