Yorba Linda’s decommissioned street signs are collectible pieces of city heritage

If you have always wanted to own a piece of Yorba Linda history, consider this a sign. The Yorba Linda Street Legacy program is giving local residents the chance to own a piece of the city’s heritage by purchasing a decommissioned street name sign.

“We do a sign refresh every seven years and the timeline corresponds with our street paving program, so when we repave the streets we also replace the signs,” said Geoff Spencer, principal management analyst for the city.

The city replaces the signs by geographic zones, completing one zone each year as a part of the seven-year cycle. The decommissioned signs have typically been sent to a recycling center from which the city receives roughly five cents per sign. But when they were being replaced last year, a resident reached out to a city official asking if he could buy one of them. That sparked an idea.

Geoff Spencer organizes used Yorba Linda street signs at the city’s maintenance facility on Wednesday.

(James Carbone)

“It was a wake-up call that got us interested in figuring out how we can give back to the community and also let people connect with the history of the streets that they have lived on,” Spencer said.

The city launched the Yorba Linda Street Legacy pilot program last October and continued it through December, selling the signs for $30 on a first come, first served basis.

“In the very first round of the program we wound up selling 326 signs out of a total of 433 signs,” Spencer said.

Since the pilot program was so successful the city decided to continue selling the signs, with the current program underway expect to run until April 28. Proceeds will go into a fund that will, in part, be used help offset the cost of replacing the older signs.

“The Yorba Linda Street Legacy sign program is just another example of the city’s commitment to providing exceptional services and programs to our community,” said Janice Lim, Yorba Linda’s mayor.

To secure one of the metal keepsakes, residents are asked to fill out an application at the city of Yorba Linda website with their contact information and list up to three street name signs they would like to buy, in order of preference. If residents are looking to buy more than three, a second application must be filled out. The city will review each request and asks that interested applicants allow up to two weeks for processing and retrieval of the signs.

During the pilot program, the city received 713 applications, more than staffers could fulfill.

Dylan Mak picks up his decommissioned street name sign from Analisa Salvado, city of Yorba Linda senior office assistant, on March 25.

(Courtesy of the city of Yorba Linda)

Analisa Salvado, senior office assistant in City Hall, is currently heading up the program, making frequent trips to the city yard where the street name signs are being stored along with other traffic signage and equipment. Salvado said she has especially noticed a demand for major thoroughfare signs.

“The biggest streets are the most popular ones,” said Salvado, “Yorba Linda Boulevard, Imperial Highway, Fairmont Boulevard and Lakeview Avenue. With the pilot program and the current round, I would say we received the most applications for Yorba Linda Boulevard.”

Like most city signs, those for sale are made of aluminum and coated with reflective material on both sides. The green and brown street name signs are about 9 inches tall, with different lengths determined by the number of characters in a given street’s name. They also have varying degrees of weathering, depending on where they were positioned and how much sunlight they received. None of the signs are “like new.”

Buyers will have the chance to inspect the sign when they pick it up from Yorba Linda City Hall, but even when the fixtures are weather-worn, not very many customers have been deterred from plunking down their $30.

“We have people from outside of the city of Yorba Linda buying signs, they want to buy the sign from the street they grew up on,” said Spencer.

Other residents are looking to buy the signs for the street they currently live on, or maybe a street carries the same first or last name that they do.

Decommissioned Yorba Linda street name signs at the city of Yorba Linda maintenance facility on Wednesday.

(James Carbone)

The next round of the decommissioned signs won’t be available until 2026, when the next street repaving is expected to get underway.

Mayor Lim said the demand for a piece of Yorba Linda memorabilia speaks to the sense of community found in the city.

“I love that these signs once helped people find their way around town and now they’re helping people connect deeper with our shared history,” the mayor said.