Oversized Vinyl Signs Back on Washington Ave
The morning of August 13th I posted about large banners for a new business on Washington Ave in the loft district, The Fitness Factory. I had written it the evening of the 12th and had it set to go live early the next morning. During the night, however, we had a pretty strong storm come through the region and the banners in question didn’t survive.
Above, the banners pre-storm.
Well, last night I met a friend downtown for dinner and noticed the banners were back — same size and location. This time with more wires and cables to keep them in place. Too bad, I think Mother Nature was right to take these things down. While I’m not some prude when it comes to signs I also think there needs to be some sense of proportion. Big is OK as long as you are not more than say half as wide as the sidewalk. For me, vinyl banners are best left to the pre-opening sort of thing when a space is being finished along with a quality permanent sign. Given what I’ve seen others go through, I can’t image how this got approved.
Perhaps this factory, sign and all, is good for our economic health and sport centers are nice as they add an element of activity to the downtown. However, may this be considered an unhealthy sign of our personal affairs and public health? When we live in a manner that requires health clubs to stay active and physically vigorous, we are desperate. We have arranged our urban environment to favor cars over people and thus citizens are more dependent on lazy life styles, walk less and must save time for the club. Making pedestrians unwelcomed, as MoDOT, MetroLink, and the rest of our leadership are doing, will inevitably lower our quality of life… but create a larger demand for hospitals! Sick…
^Huh? Anyway… I think these signs are cheap-looking and can’t believe that kate Shea would have allowed them (if she had any say in their approval, which I don’t care to research at this point).
What this place needs is some valet parking…
John,
That’s really stretching it. Auto-centric development has been proven to be a factor in obesity for sure but the sedentary nature of most work these days and the empty calories of nutrition-poor refined food products also contribute greatly to modern illnesses.
Also, it’s a gross oversimplification to broadly state that Metrolink is actively making pedestrians unwelcome. Are there stations not optimized for pedestrians, some are but they cannot change all the zoning and land use around their stations and reorient those uses and densities of population. They have to deal with developers and municipalities that are not always on the same page.