Typo alert for city signage

Photo: Facebook - Phred Martin

A few new City of Kelowna directional signs are missing today after more than one typo was found after they were installed this week.

One particular sign typo caught the attention of Phred Martin who posted it to Facebook. The sign located at the entrance to Stuart Park unintentionally read 'Kelowna Yatch Club' instead of Kelowna Yacht Club.

While some online had a laugh about the spelling boo-boo, Martin was less than impressed with city's apparent mistake.

“The design is poor, it lacks any sense of authentic place – the design is too generic. Even the maps are boring to look at. But worst of all, at least spell check the work,” wrote Martin on Facebook.

“There are only 15 words (not including the distances) and was it still too much effort to spell check? Doing bad work is one thing. But to do bad work badly.”

Brad Kruza was more kind online.

“Some people are just too serious and should lighten up and maybe find a different topic to pick apart,” said Kruza.

“Calling it embarrassing, boring? I can't imagine whoever designed it did this on purpose!”

“I thinking yatching is a new sport that includes playing Yahtzee while yachting,” joked Alexis MacMillan on Facebook.

Tom Wilson, with the City of Kelowna, says the grammatically incorrect sign was pulled within two hours of its installation after the mistake was noticed by city staff.

He says a couple other signs containing typos were caught by city staff during the installation process and were pulled immediately.

Wilson says the city sent the correct information and spelling to the contractor, but the contractor missed the spell check.

“We presented them with correct information, but the contractor had a few typos and we caught them as they were being installed,” says Wilson. “There were only three or so throughout the whole city.

Wilson says the signs will be fixed and reinstalled at the expense of the contractor, not the tax payer.

“You do wonder how that happens, as we all do,” says Wilson. “But, we also know everybody makes mistakes, we make mistakes. And as long as they are found and corrected we can move on and it is fine.”

He anticipates the new correct signage will be installed in the next few weeks.