I'm guessing they're purple because purple isn't an "official color" of the US road system.So purple let's you know you're no longer on a US highway you're now in a whole new world.... WDW property!
Tired to find the official answer, but only came up with this site Disney Road Signs, it explains that Disney is it's own city/government "Reddy Creek" and therefore I guess this is why, but not sure of the reason behind the color?!?! Hum... it's probably based on a movie/cartoon, or something else like that. Maybe it's a easier color to see? Makes you sub conciously (sp?) happy?
Originally posted by f16 A local magazine is having a trivia contest, and I thought you guys might know the answer: Why are the road signs on WDW property purple?
Purple is my favorite color too! We love the WDW road signs (even when they are confusing), because they are another little touch that let's us know we are on vacation!
The answer is that birds do not like the color purple. Therefore, they will not sit on the signs and "do their business". This will save tons of money because no one has to clean bird poop off the WDW signs.
Hmmm.... when I was a CM at WDW I was told that Mrs. Eisner picked the colors of the new signs and the new designs on the buses (the "DISNEY TRANSPORT" one).
The reason for the color scheme was to differentiate when you entered the private property of WDW from the general highways of Central Florida.
Sussman/Prezja designed the current sign system. They used a combination of Univers and Plantin fonts on the signs. The color styling began with Mickey as stated by a previous poster. There were 750 signs at the printing of "Since the World Began".
It's funny because my husband and I were just remarking how difficult it was to read the signs because of the coloring. We especially had trouble noticing the signs and reading them at night. I thought that this was what this thread would be discussing--guess we are getting too old!
I love the purple and red signs in the daytime but am like the other poster who said that she could not see them at night. Not sure why that is. I have trouble at night with bright lights in the dark. Is one of the many reasons I love DW, the bus transportation.
But MY guess is that purple is the color of royalty. Magic Kingdom was the first park and is the one that most folks associate with WDW. Purple - royalty!!!!