Philip Garvey

• Head of Faculty at Garvey and Associates

Research and common sense attest to the fact that on-premise projecting signs are more detectable and are readable further away and at smaller sizes than wall-mounted signs. The objective of the current study was to conduct a small-scale field validation of earlier research on minimum letter heights for wall signs and to provide associated minimum...

Flashing yellow warning lights notify drivers about the presence of work along the road. Current standards for these lights address performance of the individual light but not how lights should function when multiple lights are used. In the present study, warning lights were used to delineate a lane change taper in a simulated work zone. Lights fla...

Freestanding on-premise signs are commercial signs that are not attached to buildings or other structures and include ground-mounted, monument, pylon, and pole signs. This report focuses on issues related to the appropriate mounting height of freestanding signs. The objective of this report is to develop best practices for optimal freestanding on-p...

Reducing the potential for crashes involving front line service workers and passing vehicles is important for increasing worker safety in work zones and similar locations. Flashing yellow warning beacons are often used to protect, delineate, and provide visual information to drivers within and approaching work zones. A nighttime field study using s...

This paper presents ongoing results from a Tractor Driving Simulator study at Penn State University studying how tractor overturn events can be prevented. The simulator is used to expose subjects, in a controlled environment, to situations that would be unsafe to test in the field. Two sets of experiments are examined here. The first experiment con...

Objective: To assess the legibility of a large set of existing large format display fonts. Background: The enormous selection of fonts allows for creative design; however, while there has been a lot of research on print and computer font legibility, only a limited number of large format display font studies have been conducted. Method: Sixty-four s...

Developing devices for stability monitoring and rollover alerts is a promising possibility to prevent overturn events, which pose a severe risk to tractor operators. However, performing relevant tests with operators in the field is dangerous and impractical. As an alternative, this work identifies the challenges of simulating a tractor driving envi...

The main objective of this research was to compare the legibility distance of the negative-contrast Clearview typeface with that of comparable FHWA Standard Alphabets on black-on-white signs in the daytime and nighttime for older and younger motorists. Mixed-case Clearview (2-B, 3-B, and 4-B) was compared with both mixed-case and uppercase FHWA Sta...

Poorly visible on-premise commercial signs have been associated with reduced safety because drivers trying to locate and make sense of these signs may drive slower than the rest of traffic and perform erratic, last-second maneuvers. One of the main reasons for reduced sign visibility is poor sign lighting. In addressing this issue, research has dem...

According to a 2004 National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) report, approximately 250 to 350 fatalities occur each year due to incidents involving production agriculture workers and tractors. Tractor overturns account for about 150 to 200 of these deaths. The goals of this project were to study operators' understanding of trac...

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices has grown much more complex since 1961, the year that a section on signs for freeways and expressways was added to the manual. Yet that growth has been reflected primarily in the addition of more regulatory signs and a great deal of qualifying language. The standards for sign legibility and layout have...

Shoulder and centreline rumble strips are used on highways in the USA to prevent single-vehicle run-off-road and opposite direction crashes. Both rumble strip types have been shown to provide positive safety benefits on a variety of roadway types. The elevated in-vehicle sound and vibration levels produced by rumble strip patterns provide the alert...

Guidelines in the U.S. Department of Labor's Hazardous Occupations Order in Agriculture (AgHO) regulations state that youth can receive tractor safety certification after participating in a 10-hour course, or receive tractor and machinery safety certification after participating in a 20-hour course. An additional four hours of orientation to on-far...

Like many cities in the United States, Miami Beach, Florida, has developed a wayfinding signage plan for its urban neighborhoods. The architectural firm hired by the city recommended use of the Futura typeface; however, the federal Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices and by reference the Standard Highway Signs book specify that all signs on p...

Tractor rollover incidents are responsible for the death of approximately 200 U.S. farmers every year. Tractor operators are often incapable of predicting overturn, and once a tractor reaches its critical overturn angle, operator response times are too long to allow them to take corrective action. Research conducted at the Pennsylvania State Univer...

Annually, nearly 350,000 parked/disabled motor vehicle crashes occur in the U.S. in which an average of 507 occupants and non-motorists are killed and over thirty thousand people are injured. Among the safety measures aimed at reducing the frequency and severity of this type of crash, the deployment of flares is widely recommended and publicly acce...

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices and the Standard Highway Signs Book have been developed around the use of the FHWA Standard Alphabets in an all-uppercase format for use on conventional road guide signs. These publications include a complex series of dimensions and tables based on specific legend sizes for various standard signs; howev...

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices and the Standard Highway Signs Book have been developed around the use of the FHWA Standard Alphabets in an all-uppercase format for use on conventional road guide signs. These publications include a complex series of dimensions and tables based on specific legend sizes for various standard signs; howev...

In the United States, nearly 350,000 parked or disabled motor vehicle crashes occur annually; these crashes cause the deaths of an average of 507 occupants and nonmotorists and injury to more than 30,000 people. Among safety measures aimed at reducing the frequency and severity of this type of crash, the deployment of flares is widely recommended a...

The present study explored light pollution as it may be produced by on premise identification sons. More than just "storefront" signs, on premise identification sons can also be found on the property of professional offices, financial institutions, corporate headquarters, governmental agencies, and medical offices. The present study did not examine...

The present study explored light pollution as it may be produced by on premise identification signs. More than just "storefront" signs, on premise identification signs can also be found on the property of professional offices, financial institutions, corporate headquarters, governmental agencies, and medical offices. The present study did not exami...

Storefront signs are often the end point of the information system travelers use to navigate the street and highway system to arrive at commercial destinations. To test the supposition that larger parallel signs would be as visible as smaller perpendicular signs, a variety of on-premise signs were tested under real-world conditions to determine the...

This paper reports the findings of research conducted for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to develop customer-based standards for ride quality on four functional classes of highway: Interstate highways, other national highway system (NHS) roads, secondary roads with average annual daily traffic (AADT) greater than 2,000, and...

This paper reports the findings of research conducted for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to develop customer-based standards for ride quality on four functional classes of highway: Interstate highways, other national highway system (NHS) roads, secondary roads with average annual daily traffic (AADT) greater than 2,000, and...

Although highly legible, the National Park Service's (NPS) Clarendon font produces sign legends that can be 10% to 20% longer than those depicted in conventional sans serif fonts. Placing these wider signs on narrow park roads and in urban historic districts can be prohibitive. To address this problem, a project was initiated to create a new NPS Ro...

Highway sign font legibility has been studied extensively over the past 50 years; however only limited research has been conducted on the range of fonts used for commercial signage. While earlier research has demonstrated that some of these fonts are more legible than others, difficulties have arisen in ascribing these differences to visual factors...

While attaining widespread use and institutional acceptance in its 40 years on the road, crash data indicate that the slow-moving vehicle (SMV) emblem may not be meeting the safety needs of either the motoring public or SMV operators. This article addresses the possibility that the reasons for this include its inconsistent day/night appearance, pot...

Numerous studies have evaluated the legibility of various fonts displayed in small print. There has also been a great deal of research into the legibility and recognition of standard highway sign alphabets. There has, however been no attempt to empirically determine large format distance legibility for the growing number of fonts currently availabl...

Historically, highway safety countermeasures have been developed in response to accidents. These countermeasures are based on the identification of contributing factors in the system operating environment that can be eliminated or changed so that the accidents caused by them will no longer occur. The road safety audit is a process whereby a team of...

Development of a new road sign alphabet improves legibility and recognition.

On-premise advertising signs play an important role in directing drivers. Well-placed and well-designed on-premise advertising signs can guide vehicle operators toward their destinations with minimal demand for attention. Poor placement of signs can sap a driver's cognitive and perceptual resources, resulting in erratic maneuvers such as inappropri...

The research objective was to improve highway guide sign legibility by replacing the 40-year-old guide sign font with a new font called Clearview. It was believed that the current guide sign font's thick stroke design, made with high-brightness materials and displayed to older vehicle operators, exhibited a phenomenon known as irradiation or halati...

Contrast thresholds for sinusoidal gratings of 1.5-18 cpd were measured in young (M = 24 years) and older adults (M = 69 years). Thresholds were determined for stationary gratings, and for gratings that traveled along a circular path at 5, 10, and 15 deg/sec. For static gratings, age differences in thresholds were greater for intermediate and highe...

Automobile accidents among older adults may be related to difficulties in judging the speed of other vehicles. To examine this possibility, 3 groups of observers in the young adult, middle-aged, and older adult age ranges were asked to estimate the velocity of an isolated automobile traveling at 15-50 mph (24-80 kph). Across all age groups, perceiv...

Automobile accidents among older adults may be related to difficulties in judging the speed of other vehicles. To examine this possibility, 3 groups of observers in the young adult, middle-aged, and older adult age ranges were asked to estimate the velocity of an isolated automobile traveling at 15–50 mph (24–80 kph). Across all age groups, perceiv...

The contrast sensitivity function (CSF), although containing more information than traditional measures of acuity, has found difficulty gaining clinical acceptance. The hesitancy of clinicians to adopt the CSF stems, in part, from the fact that it is not as readily interpreted as is acuity. In order to facilitate such interpretation, five indices o...

Previous investigations of static and dynamic acuity have shown only inconsistent relations between measures of these aspects of visual performance. In the present study, six static and six dynamic visual sensitivity measures were gathered on 49 persons aged 7 to 61 years (M = 31 years). Contrary to previous findings, it was determined that when tr...

Contrast sensitivity was measured at near using the Vistech 6000 Contrast Test System (VCTS) in 287 persons aged 4 to 87 years. Obtained data compared well with those previously reported for the Vistech charts. Results indicate an age-related loss in sensitivity to intermediate and higher spatial frequencies. This is consistent with the age trends...

The effects of target wavelength on the resolution of moving targets were investigated over a range of target velocities under both photopic and scotopic viewing conditions. The wavelength of the photopically matched targets had no effect on dynamic acuity under the bright background condition. However, with low background luminance the wavelength...

The effects of target borders on the ability of observers to resolve moving targets (Landolt Cs) under a range of conditions were examined. Contrary to reported findings with stationary targets, it was predicted that the presence of borders would improve acuity for slow-moving targets because (i) overall stimulus energy is kept relatively constant...