Tern (font)

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Overhead signpost in TERN font at the Wien-Kaisermühlen junction

Tern (Trans European Road Network; as TERN written) is a font that under the 6th  Framework Program as an EU project "In-Safety / SOMS" of the organization Profit Non- International Institute for Information Design (IIID) developed has been.

development

The process, which started in February 2005, was completed in 2008. The European-wide harmonization of static traffic signs and variable message signs for the representation of pictograms and written information was named as the aim of the new traffic writing. The Austrian Minister of Transport, Doris Bures , stated that the goal in a query was "the development of language-independent and language-independent information on traffic control systems and static signposts on motorways", as well as the development of the traffic script Tern for use on standard traffic signs and on matrix displays .

A total of 3,000 symbols or pictograms were designed and subjected to several series of tests. The two fonts contained in Tern were " tested for the best possible legibility and suitability for 20 EU languages (including Greek)". In contrast to the previous design practice, empirical evaluation was used to develop the font that can be used throughout Europe .

As part of the study, three of the most common and influential European fonts from 28 traffic fonts were used for a comparative evaluation of their legibility. These were the British Transport ( Transport D and Transport 360 ), the Dutch RWS ( RWS Ee VL and ANWB Ee ) and the German DIN 1451 standard ( DIN Mittelschrift and MITT2R ), each in a variant for static traffic signs and WVZ in a rasterized version with a height of 24 pixels. Font design experts compared Tern to these fonts letter by letter and analyzed their advantages and disadvantages in terms of legibility. In addition, the readability of the fonts was tested in a double-blind process with 122 motorists who were searched for as a random sample via advertisements from Germany and Austria. The test persons had to read out the letters from randomly presented rows of letters in different fonts and from different distances. (98 test subjects provided usable data, 24 of the original 122 results had to be excluded due to the test subjects' poor eyesight.)

The Austrian Stefan Egger and the German typographer Erik Spiekermann were involved in the development . The project was co-financed by ASFINAG , the Federal Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology and the Austrian Road Safety Fund .

commitment

Netherlands

In the Netherlands, the font has been used on electronic traffic signs (VMS) since 2009 .

Austria

For the first time since the introduction of the road traffic regulations in 1960 (StVO 1960), the traffic script for the lettering of traffic signs is standardized. According to the current Road Traffic Sign Ordinance (StVZVO 1998) , the non-standardized fonts "Breitschrift" and "Engschrift" have to be applied to the traffic signs so far. The StVZVO shows in Annex 8 on a grid field what the individual letters should look like, but the individual letters are not specified. The sign manufacturers therefore had to orientate themselves towards the optical replica. When all signs are replaced with the new Tern in a few years , the typeface should be uniform throughout Germany.

The Tern font has been used in Austria since around mid-2010. In the federal state of Upper Austria , traffic sign boards with the new font have been set up since mid-2009. According to the Minister of Transport, work is currently (May 2011) in her department “on a possible change in the technical framework for road traffic signs”. Nevertheless, even if an amendment to the Road Traffic Sign Ordinance (StVZVO) were passed, there would be no obligation to exchange due to the new font, which goes beyond the previous exchange obligation under the StVO. Furthermore, traffic signs will only have to be exchanged if they are, for. B. are worn out by the weather or if they have been damaged. As a result, there is no increase in costs due to the conversion of traffic signs and new installation. Thus, years of parallel use of both scripts can be expected.

Although the new traffic script is to become valid throughout Europe, there is an exception for Austria, as a narrower spacing (called "Engschrift") than that of the commonly used script (called "Breitschrift") is used for long place names.

  • "TERN" font

  • "Austria" font

Slovakia

Since April 2014, the Tern font has also been a standardized font in Slovakia .

  • Font "TERN" in Slovakia

  • IS 3 - Návesť pred križovatkou (trojpruh; prípojka, dva ciele) .png

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c query response AB 08075, GZ. BMVIT-11.500 / 0002-I / PR3 / 2011 (PDF; 55 kB), the Federal Minister for Transport, Innovation and Technology , May 24, 2011, on parliamentary question No. 8170 / J (PDF; 42 kB) of March 31 2011. Retrieved March 14, 2011.
  2. ^ The results in detail: M. Smuc et al .: EU project In-Safety: Font design in a nutshell . In: ZVR, 1/2009, see literature .
  3. ↑ a b How to write »Salzburg« recently. In: Die Presse , July 17, 2010. Retrieved March 14, 2011.
  4. ↑ a b New font for Austria's traffic signs. In: oesterreich.ORF.at , March 7, 2011. Retrieved October 24, 2013.
  5. ↑ iiid.net ( Memento of the original from February 24, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved June 13, 2014 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.iiid.net
  6. ↑ The fonts used so far according to the Road Traffic Sign Ordinance are often referred to as the Austrian font .
  7. ↑ a b New traffic sign font to prevent accidents. In OÖ Nachrichten , November 15, 2010. Retrieved March 14, 2011