Wayfinding: Integrating with Calgary’s city centre

by all | 28 July 2013 8:30 am

By Graham Gerylo and Mark VanderKlipp
The goal of a recent urban wayfinding project was nothing less than to show the way for Calgary to become a world-class city. This ambitious effort required a high degree of collaboration between multiple stakeholders from the outset.

An ‘integrated design’ model proved successful among these stakeholders, who included designers, signmakers and the municipal government’s communications department. They knew the project would extend well beyond the scope of a traditional wayfinding sign system, so they also engaged further stakeholders representing tourism, business revitalization zones (BRZs), cultural venues, parks, transit and roads, along with accessibility advocates and the city’s design, planning and administrative teams. They all collaborated to plan and implement the signage rollout.

In the hub
Calgary’s city centre is bordered by two rivers and two major transportation corridors. Within these borders is a mix of commercial and residential developments ranging in age, from 100-year-old buildings to recently completed landmarks.

Home to more than 6,000 businesses and 159,000 workers, the city centre serves not only as Calgary’s ‘economic engine,’ but also as a major hub of commerce for much of Western Canada. It touts many world-class visitor destinations, including special events and festivals that draw millions of tourists each year.

When many potential visitors think of Calgary, for example, they think of the Calgary Stampede, an annual 10-day event hosted in the city centre. And indeed, the celebration in 2012 of the stampede’s 100^th anniversary was one of the factors that motivated the development of the new wayfinding program.

A new plan
In 2007, Calgary’s municipal council approved a new plan for the city centre. The direction was to implement a new vision for the downtown area, “to create a more livable, thriving and caring core.” Some of the key objectives of the plan were to solidify and reinforce the role of the area as a centre of arts, culture, recreation, tourism and entertainment. The plan contained more than 300 ‘action items’ for improving the city centre, one of which involved developing a new approach for urban wayfinding.

This particular action item was referenced in multiple chapters of the plan, since the wayfinding program would need to address a variety of objectives, including promoting and enhancing pedestrian movement, facilitating transit and vehicular modes of traffic, highlighting tourism-related opportunities, supporting street-level activity and encouraging further economic development.

Strategy
Meeting the aforementioned objectives required an understanding of the expectations and needs of various internal groups and eventual users of the system. This called for a comprehensive strategy to gain broad input across the city centre and, thus, support for a wayfinding sign system that would be consistent with the area’s language, logic and culture.

The collaborative process was designed to ensure key players were involved at the most appropriate stage of the program’s development. While such a drawn-out process of engagement may seem time-consuming and onerous, it was also viewed as a worthwhile investment in the project. In the end, time spent on the strategy phase would pay dividends by clarifying expectations and paving the way to a smooth process for designs and approvals.

Through discussions of objectives, it became possible to identify the shared interests for the program across a broad spectrum of city centre representatives. As each group could voice its concerns and desires for the program, they ended up educating each other and aligning their expectations before sign design even began.

So, the strategy involved balancing viewpoints and making sure all of the contributors would see their ideas incorporated into the final result. This fostered a sense of ownership of the program and, hence, a strong endorsement of the project whenever any issues arose. The same groups lobbied for funding and political support and provided space on their property for the installation of the signs, as they knew doing so would allow them to reap greater benefits from the program.

The result of the strategy phase was the establishment of three simple principles for the project.

Everyone’s a pedestrian
The first principle was grounded in the city centre plan, which acknowledged that whether people were walking from home or a hotel, getting off a bus or light-rail transit (LRT) train, riding a bicycle or driving to the downtown area, they will always be on-foot at some point.

Speaking Calgarian
The second principle recognizes the importance of a wayfinding program using terminology that reflects the language and logic of the locals. The strategy phase involved exploring terms commonly used to describe the city centre’s districts, destinations and events, as well as the existing ‘visual language’ of the streetscape and transit system elements.

Connecting centres of activity
The third and final principle was to integrate the sign system with the logic of Calgary’s street grid. Since many destinations are spread out relatively far, it was important for the signs’ various wayfinding elements to support pedestrian traffic flows by helping visitors to orient themselves and then to decide whether to walk, take public transit or drive.

Design
Similar to the strategy phase, the design process incorporated input from various parties at key stages, from conceptual to detailed designs, production of shop drawings, engineering, fabrication and installation. Community groups were more involved upfront, while city staff and sign fabricators became more involved as the process moved toward implementation.

Conceptual design began as an outgrowth of the feedback received during strategy sessions. That input provided insight into the constraints and opportunities available as the wayfinding information was designed to fit the environment.

Detailed design concepts were developed to demonstrate the project’s principles in visual form, with consideration given to scale, colour, typography, use of materials and visual context within the streetscape. These helped make the project more ‘real’ for all involved.

This was the first time the various groups had ever been called to agree upon a single visual standard for wayfinding to represent all of them. Previously, each district, destination and event used its own means to provide direction. The design phase was an opportunity to receive their unvarnished opinions and learn from their experiences.

Initial design concepts led to one selected program. With the help of multiple city departments, the program was refined until it was judged an appropriate expression of the city centre.

In the end, the design process helped meet four key objectives for the wayfinding signage:

• Help locals and visitors find their way easily around the city centre.
• Raise awareness of attractions and points of interest throughout the downtown area.
• Enhance locals’ confidence to venture out more and explore their city.
• Help provide memorable experiences for visitors.

Implementation
With the assistance of city departments, the program’s design process had anticipated all of the potential hurdles that could be encountered during implementation.

The local government was required to follow a strict procurement process when awarding the fabrication contract. There were two options: a standard tender, which would mean contracting the work based only on the lowest-cost bid; or a request for proposals (RFP), which could entail the evaluation of multiple criteria.

Given that the project’s two top priorities were quality and time, the city opted for the more rigorous RFP process. That is to say, it was particularly imperative to select a fabricator who could meet the quality standards and timelines, some of which were very tight with the then-impending 100^th anniversary of the Calgary Stampede.

To enable the evaluation of quality as part of the RFP, all bidders were required to submit a fabrication sample based on the design intent drawings, which were provided by the project’s design consultants. This was the fabricators’ opportunity to showcase their experience and capabilities, by demonstrating how well they could translate the design and intent into a physical form.

In fact, the fabricators themselves encouraged this approach, as it provided an ‘apples to apples’ comparison and set standards by which their work could be judged.

The municipal government’s own sign shop would also work on the project. While one of the outside bidders won the contract to produce larger-scale signs the municipal shop could not fabricate in-house, beyond these, much of the program would involve smaller elements, including changeable messaging updates, which the city sign shop could indeed manage.

A meeting was held between the designers, the fabricator and the city departments to clarify the project’s goals, set deadlines for approvals and ensure compliance with detailed schedules.

During the collaborative process, the client team expressed concern regarding the use of pile foundations. The frost level in Calgary’s downtown core is deep and highly variable, since many parts of it run along an old river floodplain. Underground utilities also posed complications for pile foundations, which entailed an installation risk and higher costs.

In response, the fabricator engineered three different foundation details: spread footings; mounts to existing sidewalks; and pile footings where required. Local engineers approved the use of all three options under the provincial code. Ultimately, the team used a ‘floating slab’ design for each of the sign locations.

The next step was a prototyping process, which involved both the fabricator and the city sign shop. This allowed the various stakeholders to see firsthand the size and scale of the proposed wayfinding elements, learn how the sign components would be fabricated and identify any potential risks relating to the designs. Modifications were suggested and the design intent documentation was altered accordingly.

Given the fabricator was based in the U.S., the prototype process also alerted the client team to international shipping costs and processes. The prototype was held up for a week in customs before it was cleared!

Once production moved forward in earnest, the fabricator sent photos and videos and collaborated with the team via weekly conference calls, which helped everyone manage a tight schedule and ensure quality control. And when the project was ready to ship, there was a discussion of the transfer of liability between parties.

While the fabricator was responsible for building, packing and shipping the signs, the municipal transportation department would be responsible for installation, as its staff would be able to identify any manufacturing flaws and have them repaired before installation. And afterwards, a list was compiled of minor repairs that would be needed because of damage resulting from installation alone.

The design team worked with city staff to identify and approve principles for placing the signs, including the need to locate them along key pedestrian routes at an appropriate distance from the curb, both for pedestrian safety and to reduce the impact of spray from snow and slush. Since city staff had been involved in the design process before developing the site-planning principles, the approval process was smooth and quick.

Many of the specific installation locations were modified on-site once underground utility mapping was completed and any conflicts were identified.

Launch
Installation was not viewed as the final stage of the project. Instead, it was important to build awareness of the program, so locals could make the best use of the signs.

Some of the same stakeholders who had contributed ideas during the initial planning and design phases were re-engaged, to solicit their support for the municipal government’s communication efforts. There were also events, including a media launch and celebration, to help explain the program and mark its arrival. The project’s advocates were thanked for their input and support.

Training programs were developed for front-line staff, including those at the city’s tourism bureau, as well as hotel concierges, who would be responsible for verbally sharing the logic and language of the wayfinding system to help educate visitors about how to use it.

Also, the program’s artwork was shared with other groups that need to share wayfinding information. This way, maps generated for printed, online, mobile or even other sign-based communications would be consistent, both visually and in terms of wording.

In these ways, Calgary’s municipal government has an engaged, informed and durable coalition of many stakeholders who understand the benefits of the sign system in the context of the city’s built environment, as well as its master plan for future development.

Graham Gerylo is a project planner in Calgary’s land use planning and policy department. Mark VanderKlipp is president of Corbin Design, which specializes in developing wayfinding programs. For more information, contact them via e-mail at graham.gerylo@calgary.ca[7] and mark@corbindesign.com[8].

To read the full article, click here[9].

Source URL: https://www.signmedia.ca/integrating-with-calgarys-city-centre/

---