Installing a new wayfinding system is a major project that requires more than just picking attractive signs. Before you drill a single hole, understand how people move through your space to ensure your signs solve their navigation problems. This article outlines seven steps to help you analyse your building’s movement patterns, ensuring that your final wayfinding installation is functional, logical, and effective.
Observe your building during peak hours to see where people walk when they are left to their own devices. You will often find that visitors do not follow the straight lines you might expect but instead cut corners or gravitate towards visual landmarks. These natural paths on a floor plan are the locations where you need to provide directional cues as part of your comprehensive wayfinding solutions.
Every space has specific locations where a visitor is forced to make a choice, such as a major hallway intersection or a lift lobby. If you place a sign too far before or after a turn, visitors may miss it entirely or walk past it before they realise they have made a wrong choice. Focus your budget on these areas to ensure that every decision point is clearly marked with the correct directional information for all visitors.
Some areas of a building become overcrowded during shift changes or busy appointment times, creating movement bottlenecks that slow everyone down. Take note of these points and consider how your wayfinding can help disperse the crowd more effectively. You might need larger, higher-visibility signs that can be seen over the heads of a crowd to keep people moving towards their destinations.
Not everyone who enters your building has the same level of familiarity with your layout. First-time visitors need a breadcrumb trail of signs to guide them from the entrance to their destination, while repeat visitors mostly need confirmation they are on the right path. Design your system so that it provides enough information for the novice without cluttering the view for those who visit you regularly.
A truly effective audit must consider how people with different physical abilities move through your facility throughout the day. Check your pathways to see if they are wide enough for wheelchairs and if your planned sign locations are visible to people at different heights. Identify areas where the natural flow conflicts with accessible routes, ensuring that your signage helps everyone reach their goal safely.
As you walk through your corridors, pay close attention to what a visitor sees from a standing position at every major junction. Obstructions like pillars, hanging lights, or existing fire equipment can easily hide a sign if you do not check your sightlines carefully. You should ensure your signs are placed high enough to be seen from the back of a group but low enough to be easily readable by those walking past.
Before committing to a final design, use simple paper mockups to see how your proposed signs fit into the environment. This low-cost experiment allows you to see if the proposed placement actually works or if it creates new problems for the flow of traffic. You might find that a sign needs to be moved a few metres to the left to be more effective, or that you need an extra sign to cover a blind spot you missed.
Performing a detailed traffic flow audit is the secret to creating a wayfinding system that feels intuitive and genuinely helpful. By putting in the work to understand how people navigate your space, you turn a complex facility into a user-friendly environment that reflects your commitment to high-quality service. Use these tips to ensure your new signs are perfectly positioned to guide your visitors with ease.
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