Photos of mundane things
Seeing as how me and CA like them.
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Oh well, tomorrow's a new day.
A picture I took in downtown Manhattan a few years ago. The sidewalks nearby were covered in arrows that led there.
The thing that really got me was the key was on the lock, like an invitation.
It's the Old Navy on Brice Road, in September 2008. I took it with my cameraphone, like I do now, but the phone I had back then only had a VGA camera (i.e., what you see there is the full resolution) and its photos were rather grainy.
...Not all that old really, but hey, it feels like forever ago now.
A strange center left-turn lane sign, with undersized arrows and a nonstandard typeface.
For comparison, a more standard one, along the same road.
This one was poorly lit, so I decided to play with GIMP's effects on it.
Some from Main Street (US 40) near/in Reynoldsburg:
A sign prohibiting trucks form using Noe-Bixby Road. Despite the orange color, this restriction is permanent and the sign has been there several years.
Some button copy where Main Street passes over I-270.
I felt like taking this picture. I don't know why, there's nothing particularly interesting in it.
For reasons unknown to me, all the traffic lights on Main Street in Reynoldsburg are numbered from west to east. Here are Traffic Light 1, Traffic Light 4, Traffic Light 8, and a blurry shot of Traffic Light 9. (I usually throw out the blurry ones, but 9 is the only light in that style)
I'm not actually sure what this sign refers to, but I found the typeface choice interesting.
The guardrails of the Easton Way overpass are shaped like the word "EASTON" over and over
This is the style of street sign used at Easton Town Center. They date to the late '90s, and aren't retroreflective at all.
I liked how the left-turn-only sign seems to just stick out of the trees.
Some strange overhead signs where Easton Way ends at I-270. Button copy, dating to the early '90s.
Gahanna, Ohio:
Coming onto US 62 eastbound from I-270 southbound.
Button copy Gahanna sign on US 62. This was probably put there in the late '90s when the easternmost portion of I-670 was built.
Backlit sign for Stygler Road. Weirdly, only two intersections in Gahanna seem to have these. (They also date to the construction of I-670, IIRC)
A weird US 62 sign where US 62 turns off Granville Street in "Olde Gahanna".
Some sign oddities:
I didn't get a very good shot of this, but these signs seem to use a slightly deformed-looking Helvetica-esque typeface rather than FHWA or Clearview. I've never seen Franklin County put up something so sloppy; I wonder what happened.
The opposite corner has "Taylor Station Rd" in overly-tightly-spaced ClearviewHwy and "Taylor Rd" in FHWA. For some reason Franklin County likes to mix Clearview and FHWA at the same intersections.
And finally, the obligatory "I just thought it was pretty" picture: A suburban Ohio road in early November.
I decided to walk around a bit after class taking pictures of signs, but this was all I got before it started raining again:
Then on the way back to my car I decided to take a shortcut through the parking garage, and I got a couple more shots. This one was interesting, because without the flash you can't see the blemishes on the sign:
Interesting. I see that font on older signs in my town all the time.
Some trees in my suburb.
A Walgreens on Colfax Avenue in Aurora.
"CentrePoint" sign. I never had any clue what this was for, it's been there for as long as I can remember. It is a short distance away from the Town Center at Aurora.
One of the Town Center's entrances.
A Bath & Body Works fragrance meant to evoke one thing to most people, evoked something else to me.
A display in Macy's for Michael Kors. Note the Christmas motif in October.
Myriad and ITC Avant Garde Gothic!
A Martha Stewart thing.
Directory hanging from the ceiling of Macy's.
More Martha Stewart things.
Riviera sign.
Sam's Club has this outside of it.
"Bakery" sign.
"Pharmacy" sign. Note the Whitney.
The entrance sign.
A laundromat outside the Village Inn on Colfax Avenue, far away and closer up.
A talking fork on Village Inn's menu.
An ATM sign outside the Safeway at Chambers Place in Denver.
"Amazing LOW Prices!" sign at Safeway.
"Thousands of EVERYDAY LOW PRICES" sign.
"Always great Club Card Specials" sign.
Two Safeway Kitchens Raisin Bran boxes. They look more clean compared to the next picture.
Safeway brand Raisin Bran Crunchy Granola. Note the shaded Bodega Sans, the packaging designer's best friend when it comes to being garish.
"Thank you for shopping at SAFEWAY" sign. Getting this one from the checkout lanes was interesting.
The store's exterior, lit up in the evening.
Gordmans "MISSES" sign.
"JUNIOR FASHIONS PLUS" sign.
"accessories" sign.
"Gordmans giggles" sign above a TV set that is always tuned to Nickelodeon, it seems.
Gordmans's exterior.
Aurora City Place banner, outside of Baja Fresh Mexican Grill.
Another banner, or shot of the same.
King Soopers' "WELCOME TO King Soopers" sign. The carts are here.
"PRODUCE Market Fresh" sign.
"DELICATESSEN Market Fresh" sign.
"BAKERY Market Fresh" sign.
"FRESH MEATS Select Cuts" sign.
"SEAFOOD & Meats" sign.
"FROZEN MEATS Finest Quality" sign.
Aisle 7 sign.
Less blurry one.
"FRESH DAIRY Milk & Juice" sign.
"THE FREEZER Finest Quality" sign. (frozen foods)
"FRESH DAIRY" banner.
Part of an Extra display, with Comic Sans.
"THANK YOU FOR SHOPPING AT King Soopers" sign.
A Christmas tree by it.
The exterior at night.
Thoughts:
I notice Colorado (or Aurora, at least) uses red arrows in their left-turn signals. Ohio still uses red balls (with green and yellow arrows) accompanied by a "LEFT TURN SIGNAL" sign.
The Macy's directional sign has a blank slot, which isn't so odd, but for some reason the blank slot has an upward-pointing arrow next to it. I wondered if something had actually gone with it at some point.
The Pharmacy sign with the changeable letters makes me think of Captain Underpants and the way the boys would always rearrange letters like that to spell out toilet-humor messages.
I notice Safeway sidesteps the whole "15 items or less/fewer" grammarwank entirely by using "15 item limit" instead.
I had never even heard of Gordmans before now.
I like your King Soopers's decor better than the Kroger decor here. Though I notice the "Right Store. Right Price." tags are exactly the same as the ones used in Kroger stores.
Also: That store doesn't have doors. Weird.
(...Is that an ambulance parked outside?)
Books & Magazines sign.
A display of artificial Christmas trees in the seasonal section.
"Joy" holiday banner. (Oddly, the Meijer nearest my house still doesn't have anything like that up yet)
The kitchen section, looking toward the grocery area.
Shoe section and clothing section, which still has the "fake drop ceiling" (for lack of a better term) I associate with older Meijer stores.
A photo of said "fake drop ceiling" compared to the rest of the store's ceiling, since I knew I wouldn't be able to describe it well.
Overhead grocery aisle sign, and a "Cake Decorating" sign of the style used within the aisles.
Directional signs near the back of the store. For some reason each section is listed as a bullet point.
For some strange reason the backs of the aisle signs are bilingual, but not the outward-facing sides.
And finally, "Thank you for shopping!" banner over the north entrance/exit.
Not pictured because it was too dark out to get decent shots: The front wall of the store--between the entrances, at least--is done entirely in glass.
I will have to be more careful in the future.
"MOVE ACCIDENT VEHICLES FROM TRAVEL LANES" on Interstate 70.
Fort Rapids, and indoor waterpark and resort hotel, as seen from I-70. The tallest part of the hotel predates the waterpark by decades; it was previously a standalone Holiday Inn.
The Hamilton Road exit from I-70 westbound. Until a year or two ago there was a continuous right-turn ramp for traffic headed to Whitehall. This has since been removed; now right-turning traffic must go to the traffic light.
Signs for various businesses along Hamilton Road.
Signs for "Eastland Plaza", a small old strip mall located in front of Eastland Mall. The building in the background is Eastland Mall's vacant Lazarus/Macy's store. (There is an operating Macy's on the other side of the mall)
And finally, a handwritten sign taped to a malfunctioning Wendy's drive thru order box.
In Whitehall:
The red bulb in the right-hand signal was out, though the yellow and green worked fine.
Sign for a freestanding Turkey Hill gas station across the road from a Kroger store.
Sign for a CVS/pharmacy.
Entrance to said CVS/pharmacy, with a neon "OPEN 24 HOURS" sign.
Out of context, this looks like you're being given mixed messages. (The left one is, of course, a left-turn signal, but red arrows generally aren't used in Ohio)
"Eastland" area (Southeast Columbus):
Hamilton Road southbound at Interstate 70. Note the use of "Downtown" as the westbound control city, as one is already well into Columbus at this point.
A large industrial structure near Hamilton and I-70. No one seems to know quite what it is for.
The only active Toys-R-Us on the East Side, as far as I know.
Sign for a charter school in a former Media Play building, originally a Children's Palace toy store. (I couldn't get a shot of the building itself)
National Check Cashers sign, which appears to be using FHWA series or something closely resembling it.
Kohl's sign and Staples sign.
Hamilton Road northbound at Interstate 70.
Eastland Mall:
The current Macy's store; originally Kaufmann's. This was added in the mid-2000s; previously this had been the entrance to the food court.
The current entrance to the Food Court. It's set off to the side a bit because Macy's takes up the space where it would have originally been. I'm not sure why the JCPenney logo is here when JCPenney is on the opposite side of the mall.
The vacant Macy's store; originally Lazarus. After Federated killed off the Kaufmann's brand, it was decided to keep the newer of the two stores as the active Macy's. This one remains empty, though for a while the space was used by a charter school.
This sign once directed people leaving the mall to I-70...but the I-70 shield has fallen off!
So, yeah
...now I remember being the only person on this one field trip who thought that the dog food plant didn't smell terrible.
The exterior of the King Soopers nearest the house, at sunset.
The old Westword logo on a rack with the paper. It is a free weekly paper.
A "rural" Ohio road in December. "Rural" in quotes because this area is largely built up now.
This signal has probably been here since this really was a rural area. I don't think Franklin County uses these single-wire spans for new installations.
The street blades at that intersection. Note the additional sign pointing to "Headley Park"
The newer of two roundabouts near New Albany. These were built before there was a US standard for roundabout signage, so the Franklin County Engineer's Office just sorta made it up.
The street name signs posted within the roundabout.
Morse Road just south of New Albany.
The older of the two roundabouts, dating to the late 2000s. Before the roundabout was built this had been the most dangerous intersection in Franklin County.
Morse Road near Gahanna. This would be a cool view if that car weren't in the way.
An obvious former Circuit City, now a "Comfy Couch Co." store.
The first Wal-Mart in Columbus, opened in 1994 and expanded to a Supercenter around 2001.
COMBINATION PIZZA HUT AND TACO BELL
And finally, Morse Crossing, the main road into Easton Town Center. Christmas lights!
@Evergreen: Yeah, I like seeing "ordinary" parts of other places too. It's fascinating to me how every part of America is similar and yet distinctly different.
Anyway, I bumped the thread because I have some Wal-Mart photos here that I will post once I get them uploaded.
This is the Wal-Mart Supercenter on Morse Road, across from Easton Town Center. It was the first Wal-Mart in Columbus--it opened in 1994 as a "plain" Wal-Mart and was expanded to a Supercenter around 2000.
It was remodeled in 2007, so it now has the Futura-laden decor that Wal-Mart used right before the introduction of the new logo and the current decor.
Instead of separate signs for Men, Women, Boys, etc. there is just one large "Fashion" sign over the clothing section.
An unintentionally blurry shot of the shoe section.
The Pharmacy area. The pharmacy counter itself was closed because it was nearly 10pm.
The checkout area.
Men's clothing section, looking toward the checkouts. Somehow the TV on the right still had functional sound even though the display wasn't working.
Looking from one of the checkout lines toward the grocery section. You can see the grocery section, being a later addition, doesn't have the drop ceiling the rest of the store has.
...I would have gotten more pictures, but...y'know, Wal-Mart at Christmastime, people everywhere even at 10 at night...hard to snap photos indiscriminately without drawing attention to yourself.
Also, the Wal-Mart Vision Center's logo and signage has ITC Stone Sans.
And I can't for the life of me see what you're talking about with the Rose Lalonde thing.