Cornell Students Complete Local Parking Garage Sign System

An interdisciplinary group of Cornell University students provided a new sign system for the Seneca Street Parking Garage in Ithaca Commons at the end of last summer. The group — known as Sustainable City — one of 12 project teams under the larger Cornell University Sustainable Design umbrella, collaborated with the City of Ithaca “to implement a clearer and more engaging signage system in the garage,” according to a recent article in the Cornell Daily Sun.

Several years ago, the City of Ithaca reached out to the systems engineering lecturer and faculty sponsor for Sustainable City to provide a solution for of the parking garage, which was otherwise dark and unattractive, after the city saw her students’ successful work creating new local bus stop signage. As part of the project, the Sustainability City students spent considerable time studying and doing first-hand research at the site through immersion, observation and interviews. “At its core, the project required collaboration between designers and engineers,” states the article’s author, Catherine Zhu (Cornell Class of 2027).

The signs involve two systems, says Emily Kerstetter ’24, one of the project co-leads. One consists of physical signs at the entrance and at pay stations for payment instructions. The second, the garage’s navigation system, now features a different color and animal associated with every floor. Sustainable City also designed matching directories stationed at the elevators.

Read the full article in the Cornell Daily Sun.