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Green to be seen
Introduction
Green is a colour we all see every day.
It has multiple uses and has become synonymous with nature, feeling good, calmness, clean energy, sustainability and conservation. Green stones and jewels have been used to represent nature for centuries. It is considered by many as the universal colour of safety and ‘go’ and we are even told that green improves focus and is good for us.
Furthermore, and more specifically, legislation dictates that in the UK at least, emergency exit signage (the ‘running man’ legend) is white on green.
Why?
What is light?
We speak of light but what, exactly, is it?
The electromagnetic spectrum ranges from radio waves, with a comparatively long wavelengths (meters), to gamma rays with a relatively short wavelengths (1×10-10 meters or picometers).
Light is electromagnetic radiation and as such is part, a very small part, of this spectrum, (broadly in the middle between infrared and ultraviolet), and typically refers to what can be perceived by the human eye ie visible light, what we see.
It is the main thing we use to perceive the world around us and without it we would be, literally, in the dark.
In fact, Isaac Newton discovered that sunlight consists of different colours, the visible spectrum, in 1666.
Whilst there are actually an infinite number of visible colours, Newton also showed that white light consists of 7 primary colours ie red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, in keeping with Aristotle’s seven classes of colour. These are not to be confused with what we understand as ‘primary colours’. That’s another discussion.
He also demonstrated that each colour in the spectrum is monochromatic meaning each consists of a single, unique wavelength that cannot be split into any further colours.
What is colour?
That’s light but what is colour?
When light hits an object, some is absorbed, and some is reflected. The reflected light is what we see and perceive as the colour of the object. The actual colour depends on the wavelength of the reflected light and how we perceive it.
Human perception
Humans are trichomats meaning we perceive three primary colours blue, green and red.
Each colour has a different energy level and wavelength. The retina in the human eye (the light sensitive layer of tissue at the back of the eye) can detect light between wavelengths of 400 nanometers (blue) to 700 nanometers (red). This range is better known as the visible spectrum.
The retina incorporates special cells called rods and cones. These see light reacting to light of different wavelengths. Different rods and cones react to different wavelengths or colours, of light. When light hits them, they react sending electrical signals to the brain via our optic nerves telling it what colours we are seeing.
Green sits in the middle of the visible spectrum at 555 nanometers.
This is where our visual perception is at its best. This means that green is the colour we see best both in terms of clarity and distance.
There is also some evidence to suggest that a combination of its nature and our visual acuity for green makes it more easily seen in smoky environments than many other colours. Technically, this is associated with a phenomenon known as ‘scattering’, the process by which light is deflected, refracted and absorbed by particles in the air changing the light’s direction, energy and even wavelength.
The ‘affordance’ or visibility of a green sign in differing conditions was apparently proven during the testing of alternative sign designs for competition in Japan when today’s ‘running man’ design was ultimately chosen – see below.
Human reaction
It is believed that the ability to perceive green was of significant, competitive advantage to primates in the past. In fact, the human species, which emerged in the forests and savannas of Africa 300k years ago, had a close biological relationship with the colour green and its meaning to our evolutionary advantage. Our eyes may have even evolved specifically to recognise the chlorophyll in plants unlike most mammals who are red-green colour blind.
It is also believed that due to our eyes being at the peak of their perception when, this may be why the colour green calms us down ie it takes less effort to perceive and hence our nervous system can relax through minimum strain being required.
A 2016 study found that living near green spaces can be linked to living longer and improved mental health. There are other benefits of course beyond the colour, the space and opportunity to socialise and how we react to nature but green is significant. The very word ‘green’ comes from the ancient Proto-Indo-European word ‘ghre’ meaning ‘grow’.
In fact, green is recommended for use in stressful environments such as hospitals, schools and offices. Historically, actors would even retire to ‘green rooms’ to calm their senses following their exposure to their stressful and brightly lit working environment.
Studies have shown that green offices create higher job satisfaction, and even that consumers spend more time shopping in stores that are green.
The tendency seems to be that we want to move towards green and away from red for example.
Green in signage
It is true that green is not used in emergency exit signage everywhere. North America and Canada for example, currently tend to use red (although in the US at least, this may be changing). However, it is true to say that most countries in the world adhere to international standards use green, either in text or as a background, many based upon the design created by Yukio Ota in the 1970’s (as seen in modern signage in the UK and signage legislation and something that the International Standards Organisation is currently urging the EC to revise the relevant directive to establish Ota’s design as the definitive version and no longer permit variants).
Conclusion
Whilst it has not been possible to prove that all the information conveyed here is behind green’s universal use, it seems much more likely than mere coincidence.
However, what is clear is that the reasoning, if only retrospectively, is sound.
It is easy for us to see. We can see it further away than any other colour, even in a smoky space. We like it and it makes us feel calm and safe.
Seems like a pretty good set of reasons to use it on a sign that is vital in an emergency situation and could save your life.
At Evaclite, we have worked hard to design products that have a consistent, evenly illuminated and ‘witness free’ (no inconsistencies or significant variations in colour, tone or opacity to compromise clarity or visibility – see patent number (GB2569053B), green and white legend that is compliant with the latest legislation).
It really does need to be green to be seen.
Hotels: 2023 Dynamic and Adaptive Signage
It’s no secret that large scale hotels have a serious evacuation problem and the majority of the exposure to this issue is revealed through social media. When there is a real fire or even a practice fire drill, people live tweet or post to facebook. Social media posts may go along the lines of, ‘it was a nightmare’, ‘people were queuing down the stairs’, ‘it took us 45 minutes just to get out of the building’. `If it was a real fire everyone would have been burnt alive.’
Does this sound familiar? Let’s discuss how Evaclite solves this issue.
Why is emergency evacuation such a huge issue in hotels?
There’s a definite divide in hotels between the large scale and the small and the old and the new. A lot of old hotels are built with a maze of corridors, with multiple exits and multiple staircases. Practically, you may start to think, ‘that’s great, there are more escape routes’, but in reality, it’s extremely confusing and can cause panic in a real emergency evacuation. Typically, when you haven’t been to a hotel before, almost without exception, you’ll go out the way you came in, it’s human nature.
Everybody knows that you shouldn’t use a lift in the event of a fire, but generally there is also a staircase situated next to a lift and one you may have used already, so you head towards that. You’ll come up in a lift or a staircase off reception and therefore go back out the same way. The problem is EVERYONE heads toward this single staircase and single escape route
Relying on this natural behaviour is where we can get into trouble.
The larger newer hotels will have multiple exits, and so the nearest, quickest and safest route to get out of the building may be away from the crowds heading in the direction of the lifts.
Let’s consider the newer big hotels, with 1,000 rooms and long corridors often 100 yards long. The issue arises when the fire alarm signals, you come out of your bedroom door and without looking (or thinking) you turn right and make your way back to the stairs, near the lift where you came in; 100 yards away, when actually there is a nearer, quicker exit 10 yards around the corner to your left.
This is because you didn’t see or notice the exit sign pointing left to the nearest exit . Up until now, this has just been the way it is, this combination of what is called ‘learned irrelevance’ and the instinct to go out the way you know, can be the cause of bottlenecks in corridors and stairways, panic and reduction in evacuation times. But Evaclite offers a solution.
How do dynamic and adaptive signs solve the problem?
It all comes down to two key factors – ‘increased affordance’ (you can see the sign clearly and quickly) and confidence (the dynamic pulsing green arrow emphasises the best route out).
Relying on our human instinct isn’t enough but with the use of dynamic signage, you see the signs quicker, you are given clear instruction and you can make your decision with confidence. This speeds up the evacuation process and in a large hotel with multiple corridors and exits, this will reduce the bottlenecks. People will now disperse to the nearest exit, as guided by the signs, instead of returning to the first exit they can think of, inevitably being the way they came into the building.
Dynamic signs will give you a clear indication to the nearest exit, but if the nearest egress routes become compromised, because of either the initial or a developing hazard Evaclite signs become ‘adaptive’. They can adapt facilitated by the ’cause and effect programming’ via the fire panel which identifies via sensors or human instruction that an exit route is now compromised and the emergency exit sign will change from green to red – indicating a negated exit route – alternate safe exit routes will then be highlighted via the green dynamic flashing signs – thus preventing guests exiting towards the known hazard.
Real life application: Large scale Hotels
With Evaclite emergency exit signs, hotels now have a solution to what could quickly become a dangerous evacuation problem.
Evaclite is working with many hotels, but the biggest problem is in the biggest hotels. New Hotels with more than 5 storeys and with 300+ bedrooms often have 3 exits per floor, with one next to the lift.
You can immediately see where the problem lies. During the event of a fire drill, people automatically gravitate towards the exit near the lift, because this is the way they entered the building. This can cause a backlog of 30 minutes or more to exit from the top floors of the hotel as they queue to get to and down the stairs yet people are often oblivious to the fact that there are two more exits at either end of the corridor. This is where the natural human response takes over, we’re programmed to both follow the crowd and go out the way we came in.
The successful modern hotel businesses put the customer experience at the forefront of everything they do. they do a lot of brilliant work around hiring and training great people, providing state of the art facilities, luxurious rooms and quality food. Safety too is now also being added to that list as a must have and Evaclite dynamic signs is a significant element of this adding another service to uphold that valued customer experience reputation.
How will it work?
The Fire ALARM sounds You come out of your room at the hotel into the corridor, you look to the right and you see an exit sign with an arrow pointing to the right, if you look to your left you’ll see an exit sign pointing to your left. Both are viable exits, but, which one is closest? At this point, we don’t know. Evaclite can solve this problem through dynamic 3-pulse array dynamic exit signs. In practice, If you left your room and turned right, looked towards the lift and it’s 50 yards away, it will be a standard, passive (no flashing indicator), illuminated sign. However, if you turn left, where the staircase is just 15 metres around the corner, it will be a flashing green arrow within the exit sign, so the sign is now dynamic. If your bedroom is halfway along the corridor, both the exit sign to your left and the exit sign to your right will have a 3-pulse array green arrow, if you’re nearer to one exit than another, the sign to the nearest exit will become dynamic.
So, it’s obvious that due to the sheer scale and size of new hotels, there will be an issue evacuating quickly and efficiently in an emergency.
However, there is an easy solution and that is Evaclite’s dynamic and adaptive emergency exit signs. It’s time to leave passive static signs in the past and move on to a safer and more visible form of emergency exit signage with dynamic and adaptive emergency exit signs fully integrating into your existing Fire Evacuation Systems.
Want to discover why hotels are making the move to dynamic and adaptive signage?
Download our free eBook: ‘Dynamic Emergency Exit Signage: Why the time is now for the hotel sector’ to discover the wider problems facing hotels and how they deal with some very practical customer experience issues.
Sign of the times
We all recognise and know the ‘running man’ of course (although he is not supposed to be running), as the image that represents an emergency exit. It is a legal requirement in fact for all non-domestic buildings and spaces to have signage like this guiding occupants and users to safety in an emergency.
What we are less likely to know is that this, the latest incarnation of the running man, was designed by a Japanese gentleman, Yukio Ota in the late 70’s as a response to a competition to promote safety and evacuation techniques. It was later adopted by the International Standards Organisation (ISO) in 1985 becoming the well-known illustration that it is today.
So, this design has been in use in the UK for nearly 50 years. Where were buildings 50 years ago and how have the built and working environments changed over this time? As a simple example, at the time this signage was invented the tallest building in the world was The Sears (Willis) Tower in Chicago at 443m or 1,450 feet with 110 stories.
Today, the world’s tallest building is the Burj Kalifa in Dubai. At 828m or 2,716 feet in height, it is nearly twice as tall as The Sears Tower.
Is traditional, conventional, static signage still the most effective solution? It was, after all, a sign designed for that time. The industry could not have anticipated the speed of development in the modern world.
However, dynamic exit signage has been designed for today’s buildings and environments. It has been developed using the very latest technology and micro-simulation modelling that was simply not available in the 1970’s. This all means that this modern solution is over twice as effective as the equivalent, conventional signage today.
If you want to maximise the safety of your working or living environment then bring it up to date with Evaclite dynamic and adaptive emergency exit signage.
There are more reasons to consider dynamic signage than you may think.
The market is beginning to recognise the benefits of dynamic over passive emergency exit signage. Broadly and, as we know, dynamic signage has been proven to be over twice as effective in terms of being seen and understood by all. It gets people moving in half the time and in the right direction, towards safety and away from danger. It reduces congestion in an evacuation by over one third and reduces overall evacuation time by nearly one fifth. It is also much more inclusive helping everyone to get to their nearest, safest exit more quickly, every time.
Even if you know this and are considering the upgrade, what you may not know is that it also:
- Provides greater evacuation control.
- Minimises disruption in a drill or false alarm (you can get people out and back in quicker)
- Helps protect your people, your business, and your brand.
- Helps minimise property damage through getting people out faster in effect allowing the emergency services in quicker.
If this finally convinces you then may we encourage you to not delay. Make your people safer by specifying or buying Evaclite dynamic signage today.
Risk or reward?
Do you own, manage, or have responsibility for a business, building or space? If so, you deal with and manage risk every day.
The legal minimum is to endeavour to identify, avoid and mitigate risk to achieve compliance.
These days, the modern business owner or manager is much more likely to take a proactive approach and seek to minimise or eliminate risk whenever and wherever they can realising the benefits and rewards, personally, financially and commercially such an approach can deliver.
This more informed and progressive approach is to be applauded. It is and has always been an important and significant responsibility professionally. More recently it has become a personal one too. Should something happen, the responsible individual can be held personally accountable with the potential of an unlimited fine and even a prison sentence should their approach be found wanting.
With this is in mind, you might like to consider installing dynamic exit signage.
Being over twice as effective as conventional, static signage, it is a powerful weapon in the business or building manager’s risk, health and safety arsenal. It is specifically designed to minimise the evacuation time of any building or space helping to plan and allow for the unexpected.
It also provides an extra level of control over the flow of people around the building in an emergency bringing additional efficiency and effectiveness to an organisation’s reaction to any emergency minimising the risk to people and property as a result.