Feds Impose New Costs on Local Governments for Signage

Ready for higher property taxes? The 5 Min Forecast is reporting that the imperial federal government is imposing new rules on the road signage across the country. Thanks to big brother you can probably assume your property taxes will go up a few dollars over the next few years to pay for this mandated crap.

The new edition of the federal Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices -- an 800-page tome -- instructs local governments to…

• Increase the lettering on street signs from 4 inches to 6 on all roads with speed limits above 25 miles an hour… by January 2012
• Install signs with reflective lettering better seen at night… by January 2018
• And whenever a sign is replaced, it must be in upper- and lowercase… immediately.

Milwaukee will have to spend $2 million to make this happen -- double the city’s annual traffic control budget. Rural Dinwiddie County, Va., will spend $10 for every man, woman and child.

Update:

The 5 Min forecast reported:

As it turns out, this is one time the feds listened. The U.S. Department of Transportation is now backing off the new regulations.

"I believe that this regulation makes no sense,” says Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “It does not properly take into account the high costs that local governments would have to bear.”

This episode is a fascinating microcosm of how Washington works. “The American Traffic Safety Services Association -- which represents companies that make signs and the reflective material used on them -- lobbied hard for the new rules,” according to ABC News.

“And at least one key study used to justify the changes was funded by the 3M Corp., one of the few companies that make the reflective material now required on street signs.”