New Tourist Signage To Guide Visitors, Announced
Tourists will soon find it easier to move around the country and without getting lost or having to stop continually to ask for directions, as the ministra de Transportes, Karla González, annnounced yesterday the placing of some 1.300 "tourist signs" along the major highways.

The new signs are specifically geared to helping tourists get to and from their destinations, like providing direction and distance between points. The cost of the signs is estimated at ¢300 million colones (us$582.500), and will also provide tourists with information on monuments, parks, and tourist centres along the routes.

The new signs will be coffee coloured and will use symbols to indicate surf, beaches, fauna, tourist services, etc. The signs will also indicate the nearest hospitals, police stations and basic tourist information for both foreigners and residents.

The first signs will be erected in the San José - Peñas Blancas and San José - Limón routes and routes to the Guanacaste beachers, the Nicoya Peninsula and Quepos/Manuel Antonio, the main tourits routes today.

Minister González added that in addition to the new signs, the road demarcation will be widened to include all the major routes in the country, but will all depend on the financial resources available after the first phase of this ambitious project.

Minister González said that in addition to visitors knowing where they are headed, it is important that they also enjoy some of the important points and adventures of the country.

According to the minister, money is also being invested in providing good roads and looking for "legal" and creative ways to better maintain the roads, including reaching agreements with hotel and tourist operators, without incurring additional costs.

The ministro de Turismo (Tourism minister), Carlos Ricardo Benavides, added that the new signs will be made of galvanized steel instead of the aluminum and other metals, that unfortunately is part of the Costa Rican reality, are stolen. To that end, Benavides said that he had been giving consideration to a plan to reach an agreement with area hotels to keep and eye and maintain signs within 200 metres of them, though he offered no details on the idea.

Minister Benavides said that the country cannot permit visitors to lose great amounts of time trying to find their way to the national parks, beaches, etc.

The president of the Cámara de Turismo (tourism chamber), Gonzalo Vargas, added that the move is an important one, but the country still lacks in infrastructure.