I am writing in regards to Ryan Simonovich’s Action Line (Herald, June 15) concerning the new signs on the Animas River Trail.
As someone who was a professor of graphic design/visual communication for over 25 years, I take issue with multimodal manager Devin King’s belief that this is good signage.
This signage gives a confusing message to walk on the right while the image indicates folks doing the opposite by walking on the left. Images convey a powerful message. This one is contradicted by the text that leaves those paying attention to wonder, “What should I do?”
When King and his crew were manipulating objects for the sign, they should have paid attention to the conflicting message between the image and the text.
Signage needs to be clear and concise, especially when folks are given only a brief time to absorb the message. Rather than having a clear text message, the addition of the image makes the whole thing too busy. Those, especially on bicycles, probably miss the whole message. In my view, it is time for a redo with a clear message.
Ed Lehner
Durango
