Stations rebranded to Great British Railways design / Rail Alphabet 2

[Trainfan2019]

I like the new signs as it's a nostalgic hint of BR days. Could do with bolder type and the red double arrows. I've never been much keen on the current modern station signs so the new signs are a welcome change.

 

[ABB125]

Those new white background signs just look so bland. Even a simple coloured stripe along the bottom would vastly improved it (ideally this stripe would be one of the official GBR colours, whatever those may be).
I do like the signs at New Street though. Much better. Why can't they all be like this?

Paddington was mentioned earlier in the thread - has it now been rebranded? I was there on Monday and Wednesday, and didn't notice anything (though I wasn't exactly looking closely at the signage!).

 

[Ashley Hill]

Looking at the S&C examples shown they do look slightly (ahem) BR ish. The sort of sign some get nostalgic about. No advertising or branding just nice and clear.

 

[JaJaWa]

Those new white background signs just look so bland. Even a simple coloured stripe along the bottom would vastly improved it (ideally this stripe would be one of the official GBR colours, whatever those may be).
I do like the signs at New Street though. Much better. Why can't they all be like this?

Paddington was mentioned earlier in the thread - has it now been rebranded? I was there on Monday and Wednesday, and didn't notice anything (though I wasn't exactly looking closely at the signage!).

The Birmingham ones were one of 3 trial options, the white ones are the final design that was chosen.

Paddington will be done before the Elizabeth line opens.

 

[the sniper]

If there's one element of BR that really didn't need to be brought back it's the dull pre-sectorisation station 'branding'... It's the embodiment soulless austerity.

 

[antharro]

^^^^ Couldn't agree more. This black on white is unbelievably boring, and after over a decade of colourful and interesting liveries and colour schemes, they really need to do better. This colour scheme make's SWR's colours look like the most colourful thing ever!

 

[Scotrail314209]

Are Scotrail stations going to be included in this?

I know the whole Scotrail brand is a requirement by Transport Scotland.

I do hope they don’t change up the Scotrail stations, as I do quite like our branding.

 

[ScottGallagher]

I really like it but would look better with a very subtle border, be that black all around or blue at the top and red at the bottom.

When RA was first introduced in the 60s , was that a Beeching idea? Was there any real opposition that the regional totems were to be replaed with black on white?

 

[PerryPacer]

Are Scotrail stations going to be included in this?

I know the whole Scotrail brand is a requirement by Transport Scotland.

I do hope they don’t change up the Scotrail stations, as I do quite like our branding.

As far as I'm aware, Great British Railway branding is only appearing on English stations, with Scotland and Wales keeping their own styles.

 

[Aictos]

Sometimes less is more, I like the design and just as a note the entire font family being discussed is available to buy for £1200!

 

[Dougal2345]

How on earth did we get to the stage where, even with everything happening in the world, it's seen as acceptable to waste money like this by replacing signs for absolutely no good reason at all?

The BBC has recently done a similar rebranding font change:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/gel/articles/introducing-bbc-reith

 

[Bletchleyite]

Looks kinda sad. 0 character at all. Hope it’s somewhat temporary.

The font is nice and modern, but it definitely needs a splash of colour, perhaps a bottom stripe in one of the GBR livery colours once those are decided.

 

[D6975]

If it ain't broke...

quite agree

 

[CJ]

Manchester Oxford Road and Manchester Victoria have had their station signages updated with plain white backgrounds and black text/font as well, not sure if it's in the new Rail Alphabet 2 font.

 

[HarryL]

Manchester Oxford Road and Manchester Victoria have had their station signages updated with plain white backgrounds and black text/font as well, not sure if it's in the new Rail Alphabet 2 font.

Oxford Road isn't Rail Alphabet 2, not sure about Victoria but if they were done together/around the same time, it's also probably not.

 

[Tio Terry]

Interesting reading the comments here. Nobody has mentioned the requirements for PRM.

What is provided is governed by the requirements of the PRM Mobility TSI, The Equality Act and the DfT Design Standards for Accessible Stations (which also applies in Scotland).

https://www.networkrail.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/NR_GN_CIV_300_01_Wayfinding-Design-Module.pdf

 

[swt_passenger]

I like the new signs as it's a nostalgic hint of BR days. Could do with bolder type and the red double arrows. I've never been much keen on the current modern station signs so the new signs are a welcome change.

The double arrows are for wayfinding to a station, they aren’t really needed on platform signage as in the earlier example photos, because on the platform you already know you’re at the station…

 

[Watershed]

Oxford Road isn't Rail Alphabet 2, not sure about Victoria but if they were done together/around the same time, it's also probably not.

They both appear to be regular Arial font and were done quite some time ago.

 

[pdeaves]

I like the new signs as it's a nostalgic hint of BR days. Could do with bolder type and the red double arrows. I've never been much keen on the current modern station signs so the new signs are a welcome change.

Why the harking back to the past (and, particularly, a part of the past that was seen as a necessary evil at the time)?
(not a personal dig at you, Trainfan2019).

 

[emoaconr]

Wondering if Merseyrail will adopt RA2. Merseyrail TOC stations still retain RA in all locations. Of course Merseytravel has devolved powers so like TfW and Scotrail, would nonetheless be exempt. The prospect of the City Line would be interesting - at the moment, stations are painted in Merseytravel colours to achieve consistency with Wirral and Northern lines. Would be a shame if GBR eradicated that consistency in the PTE area.

 

[O L Leigh]

[Pedant] That's not a branding but rather a total absence of it. [/Pedant]

I find it amusing that the cost of station (and rolling stock) rebranding is bemoaned on these pages, and yet the new masters who are apparently all out to save shekels see fit to carry out this exercise on a national scale. Oh well.

 

[yorksrob]

If we're bringing back 1980's branding and typography, can we have back trojan and Bournemouth Blue moquette whilst we're at it.

 

[YorksLad12]

Why the harking back to the past (and, particularly, a part of the past that was seen as a necessary evil at the time)?
(not a personal dig at you, Trainfan2019).

I'm not wedded to Ye British Raileways and similar, but a thought occured to me thanks to the Olympics (TM).

I was wondering what font they used for TOKYO 2020 underneath the symbol. Turns out to be a slight variation on DIN 1451 [link to Wikipedia] which is over 100 years old in its original incarnation. Sometimes, old stuff works well and just needs a tweak for end uses that didn't exist in 1905. It's not just about harking back to the past but also about clearing away the clutter.

 

[nlogax]

I was pretty happy about the reintroduction of a standardized typeface for the rail network. Having now seen some actual examples I think it looks a bit cheap and unsubstantial.

 

[HarryL]

I was pretty happy about the reintroduction of a standardized typeface for the rail network. Having now seen some actual examples I think it looks a bit cheap and unsubstantial.

It's worth noting that these examples are just vinyls ontop of existing signage, not how they'll appear in most places when it fully launches. The spacing on these are off and they don't really follow the guidelines posted previously, so they may well just be a temporary measure before they're fully replaced with compliant ones.

They're also just station name boards, none of the rest of the station signage has been touched as of yet which are where the more interesting design details come into play with the new branding.

 

[Doctor Fegg]

It's very on-trend.

Neo-grotesques with a digital accent are very much the thing right now - Apple's San Francisco and Google's Roboto being the two most obvious examples. Rail Alphabet 2 fits perfectly into this.

Recent Network Rail and TOC signage has tended to use Humanist typefaces (invariably more or less related to Frutiger), which were a design mainstay in the late 1990s/early 2000s but now look inevitably dated.

 

[nlogax]

Thanks @HarryL , that would make sense. Those temporary signs carry a lot of white space which does the new typeface no favours at all. It will be good to see RA2 in its rightful context.

 

[urbophile]

Wondering if Merseyrail will adopt RA2. Merseyrail TOC stations still retain RA in all locations. Of course Merseytravel has devolved powers so like TfW and Scotrail, would nonetheless be exempt. The prospect of the City Line would be interesting - at the moment, stations are painted in Merseytravel colours to achieve consistency with Wirral and Northern lines. Would be a shame if GBR eradicated that consistency in the PTE area.

But the City Line stations use a different font. Quite an elegant one but it's not standard branding. If Merseytravel and other PTEs adopted a totally uniform style throughout their area (like TfL's roundel, the same - albeit different colours - on LU and Overground, though not used for station names on DLR which I think is a pity) that would be a good thing.

The national network though should have a uniform house style and I'd be glad to see the end of the bizarre varieties of signage. It's not about nostalgia for BR – I'm not overly enamoured of Rail Alphabet though it will do as well as most - but about a strong brand image for the national rail network, and the relegation of competing providers to their proper place in the background. As TfL does to great effect.

 

[Horizon22]

How on earth did we get to the stage where, even with everything happening in the world, it's seen as acceptable to waste money like this by replacing signs for absolutely no good reason at all?

A unified brand of signage is generally a good idea no? Right now its a cluttery mix of TOC signs (from varying franchises), NR signs and some stations that do totally their own thing (Blackfriars, Elephant & Castle and St Pancras are ones that immediately come to mind). It might be a bit "dull", but quite frankly the vast majority of people aren't there admiring signs - they're just trying to get from A to B with the least hassle. It also fits the typogoraphy of the 2010/2020s if you check other similar brands.

The font is nice and modern, but it definitely needs a splash of colour, perhaps a bottom stripe in one of the GBR livery colours once those are decided.

I'd agree a small amount of colour (perhaps a few stripes or a logo) for a bit of flourish would be good.

 

[Irascible]

The problem, such as it is, for me isn't the font itself, but the weight they've used.

"Classic" Rail Alphabet signage was always in bold text, whilst the examples shown here clearly aren't.

Yes, that was pretty much what jumped out instantly. Old Gill Sans signs were about the same weight but the characters were wider & wider spaced ( and all caps, I think ). If they'd stepped the spacing up very slightly on these it might have looked a bit less cramped & a bit clearer from a distance too.