‘Navy Yard Station’
courtesy of ‘spiggycat’
The news came out of the ANC 6D meeting last night: “What if we just put the Nationals’ logo on there as part of the name?” To some, this is anathema, and representative of name-creep that has plagued Metro over the last few years, and a station called “Navy Yard/Capitol Riverfront/
” is just a bridge too far. To others, it’s a sort of visual shorthand, designed to keep the name of the stadium tolerable, while adding useful visual cues.
I’m of two minds. While I’d rather they call it Navy Yard/Nationals Park, instead of using just the Curly W, adding the logos of the teams that play near various Metro stations could be a lucrative form of branding for area sports teams to stake their territory and make a station “theirs”. How awesome would it be if you came off at Chinatown with Caps and Wizards banners hanging from the vaulted station ceilings, proclaiming DC’s pride in their franchises? And think of what they would pay for the privilege. With Metro’s budget hurting, who’s to turn away advertising like that?
The fear is, of course, that this would spread beyond organizations of local civic pride and toward organizations like Target, Wal-mart and others, and that may pollute the “clean lines” of the Metro. I think it could go either way. Sensibly maintained, it could be an easy shorthand for people to use on the metro. “Look for the curly W” is an easy thing to say.
I live and work in the District of Columbia. I write at We Love DC, a blog I helped start, I work at Technolutionary, a company I helped start, and I’m happy doing both. I enjoy watching baseball, cooking, and gardening. I grow a mean pepper, keep a clean scorebook, and wash the dishes when I’m done. Read Why I Love DC.
If Walmart and others are willing to pay, why not?
As long as people know which lines to get off at, let’s let the companies pay and get NEW REVENUE into the Metro system
Seriously, will you really care if your usually exit as some corporate logos on it? Or the name changes? Or….something along those lines? Really?
An annoying DC habit is the assumption by TPTB that everybody is already from here so obviously knows where things are – when in fact we have millions of visitors each year who always need the most basic information at all times. Changing a descriptive Metro station name to just a trademark/symbol that everyone is just supposed to know the meaning of is just so very typical of this. Have the logo in addition to the station name? Fine – In place of the station name? No way