An NJ 37 shield is missing here, on Cedar Grove Rd. in Toms River. Photo courtesy Scott Colbert.


Scott Colbert found me a pair of MILE 4 signs by Alexandria Dr. that just happen to have been erected by "NJDT". (My photo is the last one, but not as close up.) Yup, state-erected signs on a highway that has never been state maintained. Anyone with a rational explanation?


Malls are usually good places to find unusual signs, but the Seacourt Pavilion in Toms River has for a change this old-looking black-on-white sign, dating from the opening of the mall (across from a "real" mall, the Ocean Co. Mall). Hooper Ave. is CR 549, and Bay Ave. is CR 571. By the way, this mall isn't that old at all, so the signs are just poor quality.


County squares NB and SB, respectively, at what I believe is the world's only surface cloverleaf. Because both roads are fairly major, they each have jughandles for left turns, and to minimize disruption on either road the jughandles were made loops after the intersection, instead of ramps prior to it that would require crossing traffic. Once those loops were in, the engineers just added right-turn lanes on the outside to prevent weaving with the loop traffic, and voilą! By the way, each of the near sides of the intersection has an LGS with a rectangle; the signs on the far sides of the intersection all have pentagons, probably because they only have to display the route once instead of twice. Gee, talk about cost-saving here. What I don't get is why some of the rectangular shields have yellow numbers and others have white (see the CR 571 page, link below, for another).


Well, Ocean County must have read my site, because they "fixed" the signs. I preferred the rectangles.


A trio of SB signs leading up to CR 571, with some stunted growth on the first one.


Courtesy Scott Colbert, Church Rd. EB in Silverton has the same interesting interpretation of county shield that you saw above at CR 571. Shields have been rectangular, and have even been white on blue, but never both.


All SB in Brick. Two tries at a proper font, two failures, and the CR 528 shield needs a border (and a county name


Hooper Ave. SB where CR 549 turns onto Brick Blvd., then the reverse situation on Brick Blvd. NB. Yes, the 549 shield is blue, not green, but it could use a yellow outline.


If you go straight on Hooper, it bends around through Cedar Bridge (part of Brick Twp.) and comes back to CR 549. Since 549 is named Brick Blvd., this may be Old CR 549, but it's just plain Hooper Ave. About 1/4 of the signs incorrectly add the "old", and this is the only one that's overhead.


Is this a visible enough way to prevent left turns? Normally this would say "E" with a left arrow even though SB left turns aren't allowed.


NB at NJ 70, with this old sign pointing westward.


Using a shield is an improvement over text, but both of these signs have so many problems motorists are better off uninformed. Courtesy Scott Colbert.


Past all that mess, things get groovy and old again. CR 549 makes a completely unsigned left turn via a loop jughandle onto Lanes Mill Road, and the sign in the second photo is actually a U-turn loop to CR 549 SB.


NB on Lanes Mill Rd. at Burnt Tavern Road, where CR 549 crosses the Parkway and makes a quick left that I missed and ended up at NJ 70 instead.


The second time around, I found the right turn, and missed a bear left. Oh well, I came back in time to find these shields just west of the next Parkway underpass (and won two free CD's from the radio!). As you can see, upon turning onto Herbertsville Rd., CR 549 lives out the rest of its life facing east-west instead of north-south.


North West of those non-cutout white shields is yet another one, with a different streamlined look.


End of the road, whatever direction you wish.

Onto Spur CR 549 (both of them)

Onto CR 571
onto CR 528
Onto NJ 70
Onto CR 547
Into Ocean County
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