Old Irish meets modern European
Letter confusion – old Irish meets modern European…
Inexpert handling of drawing new letters is likely to cause confusion – an uppercase faux Irish ‘A’ (In lowercase style) and a lowercase ‘i’ without a dot are examples of this confusion in the design of the ‘Irish language italic’ in Ireland’s bilingual road signs.
Characters commonly mistaken for each other (Jury 2002) must receive particular attention from the designer of road signs, this is confirmed by (Spencer et al. 1973b). Lowercase ‘a’ and ‘o’ are cited as such problematic letter forms. Even if this re-design of the type were well executed, it is inappropriate to create stylised letter shapes. Unusual letter forms are likely to inhibit readability of place names. Moreover, in common usage Irish is set in contemporary typefaces and this should be reflected in signs.Read More...
Some background on the evolution of the UK's signs
A little of the history of the UK’s road signs.
Looking at the UK’s National Archive I was struck with the fact that the situation there could have been very different, were it not for the intervention of one or two decisive individuals...
“...it has long been my belief that we would do best to submit all our proposed traffic signs to a consultant industrial artist, who is a expert on lettering. I know it can be argued that, having adopted an alphabet, all the rest is merely routine. I know too that a special relationship has been built up between the Ministry and the sign manufacturers, which introduction of a third party in the form of a consultant would complicate. Nevertheless it is remarkable what a good designer can do to the appearance of simple things, as any attentive reader to the productions of the Council of Industrial Design must know. A decision to appoint a consultant of this kind would not be popular in the Department, but outside it would, I believe, be well received.” (Allen, National Archives, 1957)
It appears, unfortunately, there was no such champion of design in Ireland, but here I’ll outline a few points around the genesis of the UK solution.
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Legal context of Ireland's road signs
Irish road sign design in legal context
The law
Alongside the design context of Ireland’s road signs, the sign system lives in the context of national legislation. But as the design context has changed – not least with our first national high speed roads nearing completion – the legislative context has also changed.
The issue of prominence
The Government’s Statement on Language promises equal status for Irish but the reality of our road signs effectively renders it a secondary language.
The first shall be last?
In the Official Languages Act 2003, (Section 9) Regulations 2008, special care is taken to ensure Irish is principally prominent in signs…
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