Humorous highway signs aim to steer drivers safely | Hacker News Reader

Humorous highway signs aim to steer drivers safely

npr.org

24 pointshhs42 comments

Indian signs are the classics. "go gently down my curves"... "Hurry will give you worry"... And many more here: https://www.wanderlust.co.uk/content/9-funny-indian-road-sig...

Missing the all-time classic "Speed Thrills But Kills".

West Bengal is even better. One year they had "Save Drive Safe Life". The next year some one in state transport department realized the error and it was "Safe Drive Save Life"

I've seen a sign (in the US) with three messages in eternal rotation:

YOU LOSE

YOU DRINK

YOU DRIVE

Redwood City, CA has actual, printed signs scattered around that say things like:

“Traffic school is boring. Slow down.” “Speed limit 25 mph. It really won’t hurt.” “Is today the day your speed hurts a child?” “In a hurry? A speeding ticket will make you late!” “What don’t you understand about 25 mph?”

and maybe a dozen more. They’re actually great indicators that the city doesn’t enforce the speed limits. Which makes the “ZERO TOLERANCE” speed sign the funniest one.

Edit: The city of Hayward, CA has a pedestrian crossing sign that says something to the effect of “Heads up! Cross the street, THEN update Facebook.”

Signs are cheaper than properly-designed roads. They're safety theatre, designed to make people feel better without actually doing anything.

ah, the good old "left is right, and right is wrong" to ponder about on a 19-hour drive to Ladakh...

Another of my favourites was the simple "Better Late than Never".

I saw an interesting sign in Hyderabad saying "Think! Talking on Cell Phone while driving may pave the way to hell." It had Yama, lord of death talking to a driver on the phone and welcoming him. Photo: https://photos.app.goo.gl/FrWaV356DXfjCjWj8

I'm in Illinois and I enjoy reading humorous signs because it takes the monotony out of driving and makes me chuckle while navigating Chicago traffic and helps me tolerate grumpy Chicago suburban drivers. Road construction information etc. are still displayed so it's not either-or. Funny messages in the past on I-55 have included:

* Han says Solo Down. Obey speed limits. (when Star Wars came out)

* Buckling up is always a good Goooooooal! (during the World Cup - soccer)

* Slowing down in Work Zones is so fetch. (when Mean Girls came out)

* OMG R U Txting? I can't even.

* Please stop taking pictures of this sign while driving

There's a website with all the current messages [1].

[1] https://www.travelmidwest.com/lmiga/dms.jsp?location=GATEWAY...

OK. These are much better than the passive aggressive ones around ATL that I've seen.

Also in IL, my favorite one thus far has been during the holiday season, "Cousin Eddie Says Twitter's Full: Put The Phone Down."

Posted at my dad's cemetery, facing a busy road in suburban River Grove IL: "Drive carefully, we can wait"

https://s3-media0.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/fjAXrFcLzRE8UN4TYTGC...

I really hate signs like this.

I expect to be reading an important alert about an exit closure or upcoming road construction but instead end up having to parse some inane quip about buckling my seatbelt.

It feels like a misuse of attention that would be better served by letting drivers keep their eyes on the road.

Tend to agree. Worst one I've ever seen in a VMS is something like "Province's governor <Name> wishes you merry christmas". (Not in the US).

As a counter data point, I fairly enjoy alerts like these. Whether you like them or not is quite subjective. If it was a really serious distracted driving issue, then the entire billboard industry likely wouldn't exist.

Billboards next to highways are illegal in many countries.

That's for aesthetic reasons though.

Maybe. But it also seriously helps to avoid being distracted. I live in Seattle and drive to my parents house in Vegas, almost always driving I-90 -> I-82 -> I-84 -> I-15. Washington is great. Hardly any billboards. Oregon and Idaho are about the same. Driving through Utah is awful. Billboards everywhere some of them are brightly lit and flashing. I feel much more distracted by them.

Same. I'm in Illinois so I've seen these exact messages they mention in the article. I'm almost being trained not to look at it anymore, because I assume it'll be something dumb. Apparently it works for some people though. My wife usually goes out of her way to read them, I know.

These are overhead signs that are indeed used for traffic and construction alerts. They show the quirky messages alternating with travel times during normal operation.

I love the billboards that say, "better left unread, than dead" Maybe billboards should all go away?

Your anger should be trained more towards the incessant static signage on our roadways. It's really jarring when you travel around to find how obsessive we are about putting up a metal sign for every possible thing. It's like that Simpsons episode where Homer starts lobbying for signs for everything, and pretty soon there are signs saying things like "sign ahead".

Sounds like it's time to start thinking about what car culture in the US actually is if we need to resort to stuff like this.

These make me so happy. It feels like the kind of humorous approach to life I've seen in other countries, but too often the US errs too much on the side of being cautious, of being conservative about messaging.

It just makes me warm and fuzzy inside when someone can actually use humor in a very public way, and there isn't some stern boss telling them to stick with the script because it's 'safer'.

All of these signs should just say "USE YOUR BLINKER" because most drivers in California never do.

In Maine (US) last fall there was;

``` PUMPKIN SPICE DRINKERS USE YOUR BLINKERS

```

this is during the time tourists drive around looking at the fall foliage

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaf_peeping

You can drive

A mile a minute

But there is no

Future in it

Burma-Shave

https://www.xkcd.com/491/

The previous messaging was a lot more serious and somewhat morbid:

https://chicago.cbslocal.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/151160...

I saw it all the time when I was commuting out to the burbs from the city on 90. Every day when I was coming home, I always got a little excited when I saw it had finally incremented! Then I would feel sad about it because of what that meant. It was strange, I had some weird desire to see the number continue to go up, apart from the clearly tragic context. In a way, quantifying it like that kind of abstracted away the human element. As the cliche goes, those who lost their lives became just another statistic. If they had put the name of the last person killed, that might have driven the point home more effectively, privacy issues aside.

They have a contest on the morning radio show semi-often when some band comes to town for these messages in Phoenix--Bernie's in town later today so they would put up something like "feel the bern, use signals to turn" (though don't think they do political ones for obvious reasons).

With legalization in Canada there have been several "Funny" don't drive high tv adds. Strange thing is I don't every recall seeing a funny don't drive drunk commercial.

I guess it's just less funny when you crash and kill someone after a few drinks.

Well cannabis and alcohol are two way different beasts. It is true that both reduce your reaction times, but cannabis doesn't really mess too much with your motor skills. Obviously this depends on dosage and other factors and you really shouldn't drive high or drunk but I'd rather have someone drive me somewhere high than drunk. Alcohol makes you think you're hot shit and invincible which is extremely dangerous behind the wheel.

In the Boston area, these signs typically have some variation of "USE YAH BLINKAH"

Be careful, or be roadkill! https://imgur.com/a/kBQtJVJ

Um, "humorous" might be a bit of a stretch.

It's safety theatre. Signs don't work, properly-designed roads work. But signs are cheaper and make it possible to continue to live a sprawling life in suburbia, so.

> sacrifices the company’s well-known identity

Challenge author to find any person who is unable to correctly attribute new logo to BMW but can do so with the old logo.

Wrong topic :)

Love to force distracted driving!

MODOT did it first.

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