{"id":22759,"date":"2024-01-16T23:51:15","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T05:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=22759"},"modified":"2024-01-16T23:51:21","modified_gmt":"2024-01-17T05:51:21","slug":"no-joke-feds-are-banning-humorous-electronic-messages-on-highways","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=22759","title":{"rendered":"No joke: Feds are banning humorous electronic messages on highways"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">PHOENIX \u2014 It\u2019s no joke. Humorous and quirky messages on electronic signs will soon disappear from highways and freeways across the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">The U.S. Federal Highway Administration has given states two years to implement all the changes outlined in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov\/\">its new 1,100-page manual<\/a>&nbsp;released last month, including rules that spells out how signs and other traffic control devices are regulated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Administration officials said overhead electronic signs with obscure meanings, references to pop culture or those intended to be funny will be banned in 2026 because they can be misunderstood or distracting to drivers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">The agency, which is part of the U.S. Department of Transportation, said signs should be \u201csimple, direct, brief, legible and clear\u201d and only be used for important information such as warning drivers of crashes ahead, adverse weather conditions and traffic delays. Seatbelt reminders and warnings about the dangers of speeding or driving impaired are also allowed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Among those that will be disappearing are messages such as \u201cUse Yah Blinkah\u201d in Massachusetts; \u201cVisiting in-laws? Slow down, get there late,\u201d from Ohio; \u201cDon\u2019t drive Star Spangled Hammered,\u201d from Pennsylvania; \u201cHocus pocus, drive with focus\u201d from New Jersey; and \u201cHands on the wheel, not your meal\u201d from Arizona.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Arizona has more than 300 electronic signs above its highways. For the last seven years, the state Department of Transportation has held a contest to find the funniest and most creative messages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Anyone could submit ideas, drawing more than 3,700 entries last year. The winners were \u201cSeatbelts always pass a vibe check\u201d and \u201cI\u2019m just a sign asking drivers to use turn signals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe humor part of it, we kind of like,\u201d said state Rep. David Cook, a Republican from Globe, told Phoenix TV station CBS 5. \u201cI think in Arizona the majority of us do, if not all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">He said he didn\u2019t understand the fuss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhy are you trying to have the federal government come in and tell us what we can do in our own state? Prime example that the federal government is not focusing on what they need to be.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/us-news\/no-joke-feds-banning-humorous-electronic-messages-highways-rcna134240\">Nbcnews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>PHOENIX \u2014 It\u2019s no joke. Humorous and quirky messages on electronic signs will soon disappear from highways and freeways across the country. The U.S. Federal Highway Administration has given states two years to implement all the changes outlined in&nbsp;its new 1,100-page manual&nbsp;released last month, including rules that spells out how signs and other traffic control [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":22760,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1154],"tags":[25951,25955,9533,25954,25952,25953],"class_list":["post-22759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-electronic-signage","tag-humor","tag-information","tag-national-highways","tag-no-hanging","tag-quirkiness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22759"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22761,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22759\/revisions\/22761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}