This is Yet Another Michigan Highway Quirk That Amuses Out-of-State Drivers

If you are a life-long Michigan resident and driver, there are things along the state's highways that you don't give a second thought to - like Michigan Lefts. There is a little more obscure quirk that many would never notice, but some highway enthusiasts have discovered and found it unique to Michigan.

That oddity is how the Michigan Department of Transportation signs freeway exits heading to a city's downtown. Each of the exits displays the word DOWNTOWN is block lettering when, generally, all other words on the sign are upper and lower case.

The trait was spotted and shared to a Facebook group dedicated to the intricacies of the nation's highway network. After the obligatory jokes about the Petula Clark song 'Downtown' many shared that this DOWNTOWN styling is indeed a Michigan thing:

READ MORE: Look Closely - Every Single Sign on this Michigan Highway is Wrong

This appears to be common in Michigan. I’ve seen it for Muskegon/Holland/Benton Harbor on 31, possibly Kalamazoo and GR as well.

Michigan labels exits with all caps DOWNTOWNs that it considers to exit you into downtowns of cities.
I don’t think any other state does this though. Someone correct me if I’m wrong.

This is a Michigan thing. I was there this summer and all the exits with “downtown” were capitalized like this, really drove me nuts.

Indeed if you travel around the state, as we did virtually below, you'll see the prominence of DOWNTOWN signage in every metro area of the state large and small.