One of the major problems after a hurricane or severe storm is telling outsiders how to get someplace when all of the street signs have been blown away. If the kind of help we're talking about is emergency personnel then this could be a critical issue.
Here's a solution. Bury a narrow vertical tube beside each existing sign. The cap on this tube should be held in place by a cotter pin beneath ground level. A wire would run from the cotter pin up the regular street sign pool to the sign itself. During a storm if the sign blew off this would pull out the cotter pin. Nothing else would happen right then. Once the storm was over the lid on the tube could be opened and a new pole lifted out of it, complete with the appropriate signs. (The signs themselves would have been turned vertically too so they'd fit in the tube.)
The reason for the cotter pin is simple. It would keep the neighborhood kids from popping the signs out whenever they felt like it.
The jobs creation aspect comes in when it comes time to install the signs. Someone would have to do it.
Comments (3)
Locals generally know where to stop and what streets are what. GPS solves this problem for non-local assistance personnel.
Signs can be cheaply made. Traffic signs are no unique and stock piled for such situations. Street signs are easily temporarily replaced with paint on wood.
If you're in a disaster area, you'll know how to get our safely w/ traffic and street signs.
When entire neighborhoods were stripped away and the debris stacked in random piles during hurricanes Andrew and Charley even the locals had a hard time figuring out where they were. All of the landmarks were gone. A GPS system isn't very helpful when it tells you to take a right down street X and street X is blocked with one of those piles of debris. It would be much easier for a local to guide them to where they're needed by telling them which streets would work as alternatives.
GPS can tell you where to turn within a minimum of 9 feet of the street (assuming the map is correct.) On govt GPS, it is exact.
It still just sounds needlessly expensive. In a disaster, local police can/could/should post temporary signs identifying important streets and evacuation routes. The signs can be stockpiled.