Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Artifact Showcase: 'No Parking - Car Stop' Sign



We hope you are enjoying your week and staying safe!
Fresh from the museum's archives is this large pole mounted NO PARKING - CAR STOP sign. The message behind this is obvious - this would have guarded/indicated a street car stop, similar to the modern steel bus stop signs all around the country.
This particular sign does not include any transit company name- our archive does include a couple other versions of this sign, one that says BUS STOP and another that includes the name DC Transit under the word STOP.
In interesting observation; the versions of this sign that said "BUS STOP" and included the name DC Transit on them were kept at least for a short while after WMATA/Metrobus was created. We have seen these signs with a Metrobus sticker simply pasted over the old DC Transit logo - a temporary solution to a branding issue, which is a big part of transit operations.
This particular sign was on display at our special DC Transit Day artifact display back in January.

The Trolley Museum maintains an extensive archive of material from many of the transit and railroad companies from the Washington DC metro area. From fare boxes to switch locks, blue prints to negatives, our preservation efforts go far beyond the trolleys themselves.
Stay tuned for a future edition of TrolleyTime featuring other rare items from our archives. (And also a quick shoutout to Regina Koch who has been working hard to organize and catalog our collection!)