Wayfinding is the next best thing to having a guided tour of the city by a proud Calgarian. And the good news is that The City of Calgary is working on a wayfinding system for our Centre City!
What is Wayfinding?
It's an intuitive and simple set of signs that connect a common "look, language and logic." This wayfinding system will highlight key attractions in our Centre City for visitors and Calgarians - anyone who lives, works or plays here that wants to explore.
A Great Way to Tell a City's Story
The City’s Graham Gerylo has been working on the wayfinding program. He explains, "What we're looking at is developing a comprehensive program - a unified way of communicating all of those great places we have in our Centre City - including parks, shopping districts, art venues, +15 routes, landmarks, etc. - in a consistent and recognizable way. It’s a way to enhance the experience of visiting the area."
Gerylo points out that this wayfinding system will bring some high quality architectural signage to the street level - to those who want a clear idea of what's around them - of what's easy to get to by foot, bike or public transit.
Sustainable Signage
The signs will be appealing to the eye (they have a clean modern look and feel); they will also be built to last and to endure our temperamental weather. On top of that, they'll be designed so they're easy to update content-wise which is obviously a smart sustainable move.
The idea is that the cost of the wayfinding signs will be returned in visitor dollars spent in our Centre City. Gerylo notes, "We will have confident and comfortable visitors that are exploring the core more, spending more as they're exploring and leaving Calgary with a positive and memorable visitor experience." He adds that this translates to those visitors going home to share their great experiences with others: "And you know, they might not say the signs made the experience for them but the signs definitely will have helped them achieve that experience...so certainly there's a large return in investment component there."
Looking Ahead
Another interesting aspect to this proposed wayfinding system is that there are myriad tech possibilities that can be built in the future to complement the information.
Gerylo says, "You can use this same content if you are looking to develop a geocache app, for instance. ...and because the artwork is available, different groups may be able to access this information to create, say, a mobile shopping application and start to identify specialty shops on key streets in Centre City." So the opportunity is there for others to grab that data and start to create their own wayfinding communications which only adds to the whole positive CC experience.
Gerylo says the hope is to have the signs in place in time for most of the 2012 Cultural Capital celebrations in our city this coming summer. Calgary is the Cultural Capital of Canada this year and that means visitor numbers are expected to increase. It's also the Calgary Stampede's 100th birthday. Gerylo says they'd like to start putting some of the signs up by June.
Let us know what you think of this idea. Leave us a comment if you have a moment.
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