Mill Creek is not a community known for its signs, but that may change.
The city isn’t planning to alter its zoning code to allow bigger, taller signs, but it is planning to implement a series of signs that will help people find shopping areas and public facilities like city hall and the library.
The purpose of the plan, which was unanimously approved Jan. 9 by the City Council, is for economic development purposes.
“It’s to brand Mill Creek into the quality place to live and shop that it is,” community development director Bill Trimm said.
It will also result in new signs welcoming drivers to Mill Creek, replacing the brown signs that have been in place since the 1980s.
The entry signs could be among the first to be replaced, Trimm said. Where the signs will go and how many of them there will be are uncertain at this time.
However many there are, they will feature the city’s new logo and be maroon and black, which will be the common color scheme for all the way finding signs.
“We want all our districts to have that same basic identity,” Trimm said.
The way finding signs for shopping areas will identify each area with a particular name. While areas like Town Center, Thomas Lake and even the Gateway Plaza at Bothell-Everett Highway and 132nd Street SE already have names, the trouble could lie with the shopping areas in the vicinity of Bothell-Everett and 164th Street SE. While those shopping centers have official names, most residents refer to the shopping areas as either the QFC or Albertsons shopping centers.
Trimm met with the Mill Creek Business Association on Tuesday to begin coming up with names for various shopping areas aside from Town Center. Association members will choose names in February.
“I think that’s appropriate since they own the businesses,” Trimm said.
Another aspect of the $170,000 plan is to build information kiosks at various locations around the city. The kiosks will not only direct pedestrians toward shopping and public facilities, but will include bulletin boards where residents can post fliers for lost pets, for example.
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