MOAS(Arizona)
The Arizona Manual of Approved Signs (MOAS) is a document defining the design of standard traffic signs in the state of Arizona for use on state highways and other roads open to public travel in the state. It is published and maintained by the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT).
Contents
History
1964
One of the earliest versions of this reference was the "Approved Signs for Street and Highway Traffic", published by the Arizona Highway Department (AHD) in March 1964. This document contained depictions and dimensions of standard regulatory, warning, and information signs used in Arizona, including Arizona-specific signs. However, this document did not contain layouts or dimensioning details for these signs.
1978
In 1978, a full edition of the MOAS was published by ADOT. This edition included detailed Arizona-specific layouts for all standard regulatory, warning, guide, marker, and other signs.
1991
In 1991, a revised edition of the MOAS was published. This carried over many of the earlier hand-drawn layouts, but began to add designs created in computer-aided-drafting (CAD) software.
1998 (Metric)
In 1998, a completely revised version of the MOAS was published using metric dimensions for sign layout. This was a result of Federal directives in the 1990s to use metric measurements on Federal-Aid projects. The layouts were a hybrid of hand-drawn and CAD drawings, with older hand-drawn depictions and dimensioning combined with CAD-generated borders, title blocks, and size and dimension tables.
2003
After the rescission of Federal metric mandates and the publication of the 2000 and 2003 MUTCD, a revised version of the MOAS was published in 2003. Most of the content was a reversion to the 1991 MOAS, but with new signs added.
2010
A significant change to the MOAS occurred in 2010. This edition incorporated full-color layouts of signs, and was published primarily on the ADOT website instead of a hardcopy document. For National MUTCD signs, the FHWA Standard Highway Signs and Markings (SHSM) sign layouts were generally used. Arizona-specific signs were presented as drawings generated in SignCAD software.
2014-2016 (Current)
From 2014-2016, the MOAS was completely revamped on a section-by-section basis. This included a complete revision of guide signing, including establishing a comprehensive set of Arizona-specific codes and layouts for common freeway and highway guide and information signs. This revision also improved the display graphics used to depict each sign on the website, and offered convenient download of SignCAD templates for many guide signs. This version is the one currently available on the ADOT website.
Sign Codes
Prior to the 2000 MUTCD, Arizona-specific signs used sign codes in the same series as their FHWA counterparts, but with higher numbers that had not yet been reserved by FHWA for MUTCD signs. During this time, the rate of sign addition to the National MUTCD was relatively slow, and there were few conflicts.
In the 2010 MOAS, Arizona-specific signs began using an "AZ" suffix to differentiate Arizona-specific signs from National MUTCD signs.
Starting in 2013, the MOAS began using a system of assigning all Arizona-specific signs which did not have a National MUTCD counterpart a sign code in the 100s, e.g. "W8-107" for Wet Paint. Arizona-specific signs that superseded a National MUTCD sign continued to use the "AZ" suffix; e.g. "W3-5aAZ" for Speed Reduced Ahead (to be used in lieu of __ MPH Speed Zone Ahead).
References
