Walk Your City (through guerrilla wayfinding)

A friend tipped us off to this great project. Walk [Your City] is as simple as it looks: make your own wayfinding signs with time, destination and arrow (courtesy of Walk [Your City] software),  and show that everything is easier and closer than you think.


The brainchild of Matt Tomasulo, the project has not yet gone live. However, Tomasulo did put together a "pilot" guerrilla project in Raleigh, NC. Now the project has met tremendous interest and support that it has been adopted as an educational pilot project by the City of Raleigh, and has even drawn press from the Washington Post and the BBC. Currently gathering funding via Kickstarter, Walk Your City will become an open source resource

Courtesy: Walk [Your City]

You may ask, why open source it? Couldn't there be a way to make money. Twitter and Facebook figured a way to do that after years of zero income. Tomasulo, the mind behind City Fabric products puts it this way:

We believe this should be a basic resource for any urban interventionist, municipality, citizen or organization passionate about making walking a safer, sociable and healthier way to get around the community.

What a thought! Making things that will help everyone, not just yourself. We here at Urban Life Signs greatly support great wayfinding, whether through signage or intuitive urban design. Hat's off to Walk Your City.

Courtesy: Walk [Your City]

Courtesy: Walk [Your City]

Just think of placing a sign at Alamo Square, "It's a 5 minute walk to Haight Street by foot", or "It's a 7 minute bike ride to Steinhart Aquarium".  Folks visiting might actually decide to not reboard the bus and instead check out San Francisco's residential shopping streets. Likewise, you could have a sign at the Cliff House say, "It's a 23 minute walk to the Legion of Honor" and "It's 10 minutes to Ocean Beach and Safeway by foot." What better way to say, have a nice walk after your meal or your picture taking - the beach isn't far and it's downhill, while the great art is a pleasant walk away.

There are only 4 more days to go in the fundraiser, and much is needed for the Kickstarter drive to succeed. Check out the Walk [your city] fundraiser and support great wayfinding in your city. You can also find the great maps of cities, which only show buildings, at CityFabric.

Courtesy: CityFabric