District of Squamish is working on the second phase of wayfinding signs in the community.
Staff is currently working on phasing plan that will prioritise where the “year two” signs will be installed and which signs will get priority, said DOS media representative Christina Moore.
The budget for wayfinding signage proposed this year is $175,000. The wayfinding project is a five year project, and the 2018 budget allocation is for the second year of the five-year project, said Moore.
Moore said the signage is in part funded by insurance payback (approximately $15,000) and the remainder from accumulated surplus, which ensures that it doesn’t affect property tax rates in 2018.
“Phasing the project over multiple years enables us to manage the budget effectively, and to learn from the implementation of each year in order to make adjustments along the way as required,” Moore said.
The first phase cost the district $221,500 in 2017, but the total budget over five years is proposed to be $1,275,000.
The first phase includes: two Squamish gateway signs at the north and south ends of town on Highway 99; two Downtown signs (north and south, also on Highway 99); and a series of vehicular and pedestrian/cyclist signs in the Downtown vicinity and extending out to the Adventure Centre and Brennan Park along Loggers Lane.
“These new signs will help to visually define Squamish as a community and showcase our town to visitors from both the north and south. It will also help to highlight destinations and promote movement so that people can quickly and easily navigate our town,” says District of Squamish Mayor Patricia Heintzman.
“The Squamish brand is already embedded into our lifestyle as a community; this project is really about bringing our town’s brand to life and connecting our community.”
The design strategy was developed with input from a group of community members representing the Squamish Nation, tourism and business leaders, brand leadership team members and trails groups. The resulting concepts were designed to reflect an essence that evokes the words active, modern, youthful, bold, innovative, environmental, integrity and clarity.
Dave Colwell says
You mean the second wave of wasted money better spent on more needy situations and places! This is gross mismanagement.
David St Luke says
If they are going to spend this money I would hope they have signage for the railroad museum. I don’t think tourists even know it’s there
T. Carroll says
What an inordinate waste of money, and more to be wasted so long as this present Council remains seated at the DoS table – can we really afford these spendthrifts much longer?. The original signs were fitting for Squamish, its history, and its general ambience, and only needed some up-grading, such as new paint and varnish, at a reasonable price. The present signs are like something coming out of my granddaughter’s kindergarten class – a piece of greenish cardboard-like surface with white indecipherable paint wiggling across its surface. Apart from barely showing where Squamish’s key sites/sights are, has anyone – on Council, on staff, or even the company hired so exorbitantly – tried reading those signs when the weather is bad/poor, foggy, rainy, snowy, dark, in the early morning or early evening? Have they tried reading those signs with their glasses on or off, contacts in or out, or , if they aren’t youngsters with brilliant eye sight, actually driving a vehicle (including a bike). One practically has to drive up to within 3-4 feet of the signs and almost has to place one’s nose on the sign to see what the white’ish squiggles on the nondescript green backgrounds says. To have spent already $221,500, before costs escalates to $1,275,,000 is Council absolutely appalling and a total waste of our money. Stop this madness before this Council spends an additional one and a quarter million dollars on signs that certainly do NOT give a vision of what Squamish was, is and will or could. These signs do NOT bring to life Squamish’s “brand” but rather buries it beneath yet more blather, rather like the blue trees inter alia.
And keep in mind that this very same Council is seeking to increase our/your taxes by at least 5 1/2% this year. Way above COLA (inflation or cost of living) and way above other communities both to the North of us and to the South. Since this Council has been in office they have raised our total taxes close to between 22 and 25%. So should we really be paying out another $1,275, 000 for these miscreant signs?
Dave Colwell says
Well said…a sane voice in the wilderness! I think this is the worst mistake I have seen enacted by any Council since I came to Squamish in 1970. There have been many good things ….But this!???