As the second-largest city in Iowa with more than $1.5 billion spent toward revitalizing its downtown, Cedar Rapids looked to Corbin Design to develop a comprehensive vehicular and pedestrian wayfinding plan. The goals of this program were to highlight and create awareness of the city’s four core districts – Czech Village, Downtown, MedQuarter, and New Bohemia – and to assist visitors in navigating to and among destinations throughout the districts.
The system design was inspired by bridges - both the physical bridges within the city and the metaphorical bridges that connect the community. The sign frame features structural bridge elements as well as a replication of the 6th St. bridge as the decorative header.
To highlight Cedar Rapids’ core districts, a unique, three-sided sign was designed by combining banner and signage elements into a single structure. In an effort to make this system easy to maintain and update, nearly every piece of it is modular, including the message panels, banner panels, city icon, and even the decorative bridge bracket. Each district is uniquely identified with its own brand and color in the header and banner panels to help build recognition throughout the system.