MOTORWAY is the companion typeface to TRANSPORT, the British road indication lettering. The Motorway alphabet was created for the route numbers on freeway signage, and is taller and narrower than the accompanying place names and ranges which are printed in Transport.
However, for Freeway Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert created only the numbers 0 to 9, the capitals A, B, E, M, N, S and W, ampersand, slash, parentheses and a comma. So, although the lettering made its very first look on the Preston bypass in 1958, K-Type Motorway is the very first complete typeface and contains all upper and lower case letters, plus a complete complement of punctuation, symbols and Latin Extended-A accented characters.
As with the Transport alphabet the beginning point was Akzidenz Grotesk, Motorway taking inspiration from condensed variations. Changes were mainly driven by a mission for legibility, leading to some decreased contrast in between horizontal and vertical strokes, and Gill-esque straight diagonal limbs on the 6 and 9, and high vertex for the M.
Kinneir and Calvert created the limited variety of characters in 2 weights; a SemiBold ‘‘ Permanent' weight for usage as white letters on blue freeway indications, and a Strong ‘‘ Temporary' weight for heavier black letters on yellow non-permanent signage.
In addition to developing full typefaces in both initial weights, the K-Type family adds a new Routine weight, plus a set of italics, finishing a highly usable condensed typeface which, while rooted in history, is totally functional for both print and web usage. The K-Type font styles are spaced and kerned normally, simply increase the tracking to regain the generous spacing of motorway signage.
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