Because non-incarcerated people need to go there too? Visitors, new employees, picking up someone being released, protesting wrongful detention, etc. And also the thing the other person said about hitchhikers.
this post was submitted on 01 Jan 2026
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So you won't pick up escapees hitchhiking.
I've seen some prisons with warnings that say "don't pick up hitchhikers; may be prisoners" but not at most of the places with the freeway sign. Also they note detention centers. I think there must be some policy that mandates the sign.
This is the correct answer.
You'll also notice many signs warning you of picking up hitchhikers in the same area.
The typically white-on-green signs shown near US interstate exits are navigational aids, not public safety messages.
If the local prison is on the exit, it's just the single most notable landmark.
yup, lot of these prisons are placed in the middle of fucking nowhere as a form of economic kickback essentially.
local economy is non-existent so throw down a prison and bam, you got a bunch of cheap stupid employees and free slave labor for the local barons that run the county.
Are you a bot, or do you just think everyone is absolutely fucking atupid? 😂 😂
Not a bot, just a guy whose been on the internet for years. Which means that, yes, I presume some people are ignorant of facts. (And that others are fucking stupid.)
@OP posted about "exit signs", which is not what your sign shows. Which is why I described the ones I did.
Why did you assume that the black-on-white public safety signs like what you posted were what they meant by "exit sign"?
You responded to MY comment though. Not OP
For people who want to visit someone in those facilities, perhaps.
But there are lots of places that people would like to visit. It's not like they post libraries, or other government run facilities on freeways. Is there a policy that requires these types of facilities be displayed on the freeway exit sign? I tried to google it without finding the answer I was looking for.
Road signs are like zip codes : they aren't assigned based on desirability but volume of need.
While more Americans visit a library or courthouse than visit a prison, such places are almost always highly local. If you or your loved ones are sent to prison, it's probably going to be somewhere you aren't familiar with.
And don't discount that a lot of prisons were built as "job providers* in rural communities, so there are a considerable amount of employees that have to locate the place.
(If you want to be depressed about the American prison industrial complex, look up the statewide budgets for the departments of incarceration and contrast them with highway construction or education )
To mark where it is for anyone who needs to to there. Maybe so you are also aware to not pick up hitchhikers in the area, as they may be escapees.
Is this common? I have never noticed a sign for a jail.
I've only noticed them at the prisons that are out in bummfuck Cali. Off the 5 in the Central Valley, like OP said, or out in the desert off the 10.
It's possible it's a California State level policy.