Saturday, August 27, 2022

Subdivisions and signs of silliness

 

Ideas for speeches can come from right around you. Near my home in metro Boise and south of Lake Hazel Road there are two subdivisions under construction, east (Locale) and west (Baserri) of Cole Road. On February 11, 2020 I blogged about how A billboard for the new Locale subdivision in Boise went up before they even had finished naming all the streets. The rather generic name is pronounced Low Cal, so it could be just for dieters.

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As shown above, they built a monumental Locale sign at the entrance on Barnwood Avenue. The name is in black painted letters on a background of rusted (unpainted) steel. In the bright morning sun that lettering is very visible when looking west.

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But when looking east (in shadows) the lettering has less contrast and is barely visible. The word Locale might better have been painted white. Luckily there also are several signs for the CBH sales center with white painted backgrounds.

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That monumentally flawed sign provides a lesson for design of PowerPoint slides. Dave Paradi has an online tool at Think Outside the Slide you can use called the Color Contrast Calculator.

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

West of Cole Road there is the Baserri subdivision. Its entrance from Cole Road at Madrona Wood is marked as shown above, by a sign with dark gray letters incised on a huge, tan artificial rock. Baserri is a Basque word denoting a type of half-timbered housebarn farmhouse. That name is locally significant since Boise has an important Basque community with a museum and cultural center, and an annual festival. Thankfully the streets in that subdivision do not have difficult to spell Basque names like Cenarrusa and Ysursa (two men who were Secretary of State for Idaho).    

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

What is the most generic subdivision name? How about Woods of Trees?  

 

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