Welcome! An Introduction to Skyway Sign Concepts

Creating this page to collect all my various ideas for sign concepts for the Metro Manila Skyway, a limited-access expressway between Alabang, Muntinlupa, NCR and (as of February 2021) Libis Baesa, Caloocan, NCR.  I've posted for years at AARoads (as TheStranger) and at Skyscrapercity (under my full name of Chris Sampang) and have collected a wealth of knowledge from other road enthusiasts over the last couple of decades, all of which have informed my ideas here.

The current setup of the road is scant on overhead signage, except near exits on the older Stage 1 and Stage 2 segments, and for a short portion of Stage 3 between Buendia Avenue (Gil Puyat) in Makati and Nagtahan (Quirino Avenue) in Manila.  After having watched at least 120-130 videos of Stage 3 since it opened in January, seeing how small some of the exit signs are (particularly in Quezon City) and how the lack of signage along Skyway Stage 1 and 2 does not help with breaking visual monotony, I decided to play around a bit and be creative.  I also wanted to add pull-through control cities and exit numbers as well, navigational aids that do not exist at present on the Skyway mainline even though the two expressways it feeds into have both used them for years in some form.

Several people I know have used the Skyway and commented on not knowing where they are, or that they missed the exit to get on the road.  So certainly these concepts are rooted in practicality, especially when NLEX and SLEX nearby have somewhat better levels of exit and destination marking.

One thing this series of image posts will also explore is my rationale as to why certain destinations or labeling have been chosen in my design sketches.  I'm familiar with the concepts of "limit message loading" that exist in the Manual for Uniform Traffic Control Devices used in the US, but am partial stylistically to the usage of road names and control cities whenever possible, which is more akin to what can be seen in California and in Chicagoland.

In the Philippines, most exits are named, with certain key junctions having well known interchange or ramp names (Magallanes Interchange in Makati, Balintawak Cloverleaf in Quezon City, the under-construction Caloocan Interchange).  For this series of designs I tried to stick to the interchange names that San Miguel Corporation has chosen for the Skyway exits, with maybe a little variation here or there when more information is needed.


(Image courtesy DPWH website - originally at https://www.dpwh.gov.ph/dpwh/PPP/projs/MMSS-3)


All sign designs are based on Brendon Strowe's SignMaker app at https://not-ben.github.io/SignMaker/index.html which uses the traditional FHWA Highway Gothic font.  (The font San Miguel Corporation has used for the modern, Interstate-standard overhead designs on the Manila segment of Skyway Stage 3 is a bit closer to Clearview, sans-serif with lighter weight.)  In the Philippines, variations of Highway Gothic, Helvetica, and other fonts are used with little consistency, but growing up in California I strongly prefer Highway Gothic over Clearview.

As road numbering is not used at all on the Manila/Luzon expressway system at this present time, text labeling (including the NAIAX and Skyway logos, which have been used at times) will be present in this hypothetical sign set.  All designs are my own concepts and not renderings of existing installations from SMC, MPTC, DPWH or any other real-life Philippine entity.

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Driving along California's freeways and highways over the last 14 years, I've gotten a sense of how our local department of transportation (CalTrans) approaches road signing:

Reassurance
One noticeable aspect of the Skyway - and to a lesser extent the older Manila expressways of NLEX and SLEX have - is a lack of pullthrough signage.  Sure, it's "obvious" which road one is on when they are on the Skyway, but this is a country where route markers are decoration at best (for a numbering system that is haphazardly used).

The Skyway logomark would make for an interesting shield, similar to the New Jersey Turnpike shields that do exist out there, but so far SMC has not opted to use the logo in this way.

Once more expressways open up within Manila's city limits (NLEX Connector in 2021-2022, and possibly the Pasig River Expressway), simply being on an elevated road is not enough for a driver to know WHICH elevated road they are on.

In California's freeway system, and most other limited access highway systems in America, reassurance signage is massive, with pull-throughs every mile to mile-and-a-half, reassurance markers, every couple of miles, etc.  This not only helps drivers know what road they are on without diverting attention too much from their own driving, this provides a way for drivers to know what to report to a towing company or emergency services should they be stuck on that very same road due to an accident or a stalled vehicle.

Reference
While modern editions of the MUTCD have tried to deemphasize exit destinations and road names - and some departments of transportation in the US even go as far as to be scant about control cities! - there has to be a balance made between "too much message loading" and "not enough information".

On recent drives in the Bay Area, I saw how CalTrans's most modern sign installations look to retain a reference element:
- Almost all freeways have some sort of control city (the notable exception is all the way in Southern California with I-605, though I-5 and I-805 south in San Diego are also well known for lacking a southbound control city)
- While the exit names now primarily are just the connecting street, secondary signage pointing the locations for that exit  are still around
- Freeway names are used in a hit-or-miss fashion, sometimes retained, sometimes not (both seen in Southern California).  In the Bay Area, there are multiple road names with very little signing but significant amount of popular usage (Eastshore Freeway, Nimitz Freeway, Bayshore Freeway, Central Freeway) and the MacArthur Freeway has a couple of signs near its namesake interchange in the East Bay.  This is similar to how older street names in Metro Manila often retain their usage long after their renaming (Buendia Avenue, Sucat Road, Pasong Tamo) with SMC intentionally renaming the southbound Gil Puyat exit in early January 2021 to "Buendia" for consistency with the northbound exit.

As highway numbers are still not yet in common use in the Philippines, the expressway names essentially have to be signed at all times.

In the case of Skyway, the public is still new to the Libis Baesa/Balintawak-Buendia segment, and even the signage on Stage 1 and 2 doesn't always provide a complete picture (NAIAX isn't labeled anywhere on Skyway as the best all-expressway route to Bay City).

Reinforcement/Repetition
San Miguel Corporation has been good at using small, road-side signs to mark countdowns from 1 km to 500m to 400m to 300m to 200m to 100m to an exit.  (This can be seen at Quezon Avenue and A. Bonifacio Avenue)

However, this signage only appears at a couple of exits, and also seems to be based on the existing temporary 60 kph/37 MPH speed limit.

At full highway speeds the distances to start mentioning the next exit need to be longer, similar to how Don Bosco exit gets noted 2 km before the ramp split.  California's ranges are something like 1.5 miles (about 2.2 km), 1 mile (1.6 km), 1/2 mile (a little less than 1 km), and 1/4 mile (400 m) to reflect 80 kph/50 MPH freeway speed minimums.

While SMC uses next-few-exits signs to mention where Alabang and NAIAX are as far north as Sgt. Rivera, ultimately mentioning the closest 3 exits and repeating that info as one gets closer is a lot more critical in permanent highway signage.

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