"Washington Monument" courtesy of Flickr user "CrimsonMage"

Can you believe there are some people out there that don’t know what The Washington Monument looks like?

In fact there are, albeit they are probably tourists from outside the United States and tourists that also don’t know who The President is.

I read an article in The Washington Post about plans for a new signage system on The Mall that would help identify the many attractions, everything from the Lincoln Memorial to the Jefferson. While the National Park Service sees the need to help direct and point out these places, the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts and local residents disagree.

The article goes through both arguments of the planned improvements, the Park Service would like to make The Mall more accessible for those that visit it, and others feel it may detract and that the landmarks are so famous that identification marks are not needed.

Isn’t it a tad presumptuous to think that everybody knows The DC monuments? Sure if anybody that lived in the city didn’t know these places we’d ask if they have been living in a cave. However we do need to consider that while word of these places have reached many countries and the tourists from these countries that visit, they may not know exactly the location of them or what they look like.

We have to come to terms that those outside the U.S. just aren’t as smart as us when it comes to knowing U.S Landmarks. What do you think?