Kincardine looking at $500,000 signage program
By Liz Dadson

Kincardine Town Council

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Kincardine has adopted a program that would see various signs posted in the former Town of Kincardine and Village of Tiverton.

Part of the Bruce County Signage Strategy, the estimated cost of the signs is $500,000.

In committee-of-the-whole at the July meeting of council, economic development and tourism manager Steve Murray said the tourism committee approved the final piece of the program at its meeting in May. The project features new designs for such signs as the gateway entrances to Kincardine and Tiverton, directional, public buildings, parks, driving and walking tours, downtown guides, illuminated parking, rural guides, trailblazers, beach/trail accesses, pedestrian guides, a pedestrian map directory, and interpretive markers. It also includes the removal of outdated signs.

Murray said implementation of the program is expected to take four to five years and may cost about $470,000. The 2009 municipal budget contains $110,000 for this, including $75,000 from an infrastructure grant, he said, noting that council would want to do the wayfinding signs in town first and leave the rest until later.

He said the Kincardine Business Improvement Area (BIA) is putting significant support behind this program and has applied for a Rural Economic Development grant for $35,000. Also, Bruce County has applied for a $313,500 Community Adjustment Fund grant for Kincardine to be used for this program.

"Should these grant applications all be successful, the whole program could be implemented must quicker," he said, "likely within one year."

He noted that the gateway signs will be located at the former town and village limits which is why they say "Town of Kincardine" and "Village of Tiverton."

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30/07/2009 09:19 PM

In response to questions, Murray said the county initiated the signage program and is using Kincardine and Saugeen Shores as pilot projects, eventually planning to roll it throughout the county.

"The biggest part of this program is replacing the old TODS (Tourism Oriented Directional Signage) signs," said Murray. 'We can't put signs on Highway 21 directing people to the downtown and the various tourist attractions. We plan to contact the MTO (provincial transportation ministry) and challenge them to find our downtown core from Highway 21."

"Are you taking down the Bruce Township signs?" asked councillor Gordon Campbell. "Those are historic signs now."

"The Bruce Township signs are a debatable issue," said councillor Randy Roppel. "We will take your comments into consideration. I hope we can move forward with this (signage) program."

"Those TODS signs are terrible," said councillor Guy Anderson. "We need proper directional signs. I hope we can get permission to put signs on the highway."
The signage program comes to council for final approval Aug. 5.