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New station signage is rolling out in Washington, DC: first at L'Enfant Plaza, then system-wide in 5 years. Here's hoping that this mock-up isn't final as the line bullets are all too small: they should slightly overshoot the baseline and ascender of the adjacent type to look optically correct.

The line bullets are too small, the text is too light, and the directionality info is *way* too small and in the wrong spots! If you're getting off the train, you need to see that info right away, but definitionally, these wall-mount signs will have at least one train in the way!

From what I understand, the signage on the vault walls will just be station names and exit information (see below). All travel/service information will be moved to the platforms themselves so trains won't be in the way.

That'd be very nice and definitely helps with the small text, but I'd still like to see everything bumped up a size and a weight or two. It'll be crowded but much more readable than this ultra thin text.

I find it interesting that all the type seems to have been tracked in extra tight which gives it a 1970s modernist aesthetic, but also makes it that much harder to read.

It all screams "looks good in Illustrator" to me... I generally love this sort of look but for signage it's just not the play.

They say they've done extensive usability testing on it prior to roll-out, but – yeah, underwhelming.

One of my hobbyhorses is that typefaces, weights, etc. come and go, so you may as well just optimize for legibility (although, is thin even a thing rn?)

Totally agree - I love the look of ultra thin Helvetica but it's just less readable than the usual Medium/Bold weights.