Cryptic word messages on traffic signs

[agentsteel53]

probably the most awesome driving maneuver I've ever seen is someone in Ensenada, Mexico making a Boston Left (which is how I learned it!). 

from the right shoulder.

of a six-lane arterial.

he was going 40 km/h down the destination road before anyone else moved.

[Brandon]

probably the most awesome driving maneuver I've ever seen is someone in Ensenada, Mexico making a Boston Left (which is how I learned it!). 

from the right shoulder.

of a six-lane arterial.

he was going 40 km/h down the destination road before anyone else moved.

Now that took major cojones or a major death wish.

[Alps]

probably the most awesome driving maneuver I've ever seen is someone in Ensenada, Mexico making a Boston Left (which is how I learned it!). 

from the right shoulder.

of a six-lane arterial.

he was going 40 km/h down the destination road before anyone else moved.

Are you saying he pulled to the right and jumped the green by turning left across 6 lanes? Cerrado!*

* I have no clue what I'm saying, but I think it's Spanish.

[Takumi]

Cerrado means closed, so...yeah. Almost works.

[agentsteel53]

probably the most awesome driving maneuver I've ever seen is someone in Ensenada, Mexico making a Boston Left (which is how I learned it!). 

from the right shoulder.

of a six-lane arterial.

he was going 40 km/h down the destination road before anyone else moved.

Are you saying he pulled to the right and jumped the green by turning left across 6 lanes? Cerrado!*

* I have no clue what I'm saying, but I think it's Spanish.

to visualize this correctly, it helps to know that in Mexico, a lot of the time the shoulder serves as a frontage road and parking area.  the guy was parked at a business, got in his car, drove on the shoulder up to the intersection, then made his move.

[Alps]

Cerrado means closed, so...yeah. Almost works.

[I actually know that word - I have a surprising amount of Spanish vocab for someone who never learned or uses the language]

[J N Winkler]

"CARRER TALLAT PER OBRES"?  Now, that I had to figure out by context!

[kphoger]

Road closed due to construction????

[J N Winkler]

Road closed due to construction????

Yup--in Catalan, not Castilian Spanish.  In Spain there are a couple of decrees which mandate bilingualism (i.e., use of Spanish and a local non-Spanish language), but their applicability is confined to infrastructure which is considered of national interest, such as roads on the RCE and transport terminals such as airports, railway stations, ports, etc.  On locally maintained infrastructure the local language is often the only one that is found on signs.

I have known a few Britons who have confused Catalan with Spanish because their first exposure to an Iberian Romance language was on a trip to Barcelona.  This is a mistake which I think Americans in general are less likely to make because our proximity to Mexico gives us more passive exposure to Hispanophone culture.

[kphoger]

I just figured CARRER was equivalent to CARRETERA, and PER OBRES was equivalent to POR OBRAS.  If I were to see a sign that said HIGHWAY and DUE TO WORK, I would assume the middle word meant CLOSED.

[J N Winkler]

I think carrer is actually cognate to carrera (which in Castilian Spanish has a pronounced motorsport connotation--e.g. "Carrera Panamericana").  In Catalonia it is used as a city street label in contexts similar to calle in Castile; compare calle Fuencarral (Madrid), carrer Balmer (Barcelona).  Paseo and passeig, vía and via are cognate pairs which are used as street labels in the same contexts in Castilian and Catalonian cities respectively.

Carretera is actually a word in Catalan too, but the plural is formed differently (cf. bilingual RCE identification signs in Catalonia:  "Red de Carreteras del Estado/Xarxa de Carreteres d'Estat").

[1995hoo]

Thread bumped for a sign I spotted on Saturday near the South Riding development in Loudoun County, Virginia. On westbound US-50 (six lanes with a median through there) there's an uncontrolled intersection serving South Riding and the left-turn lane is posted with a black-on-white sign reading "NO DOUBLE STACKING IN CROSSOVER."

I understood the message clearly enough, but it struck me as a fine candidate for "Cryptic word messages on traffic signs" because I'd wager that a lot of people seeing it for the first time are puzzled by it–and indeed my wife's reaction to the sign was that "DOUBLE STACKING" sounds like something to do with a fast-food hamburger.

No photo, unfortunately. By the time I saw the sign it was too late and I was going too fast. I'll link the Street View, but it's not a clear image. It's the white sign on the left just ahead of the camera position. http://goo.gl/maps/gbhox

[Duke87]

So is that supposed to mean "only one vehicle allowed in the crossover at a time", then?

[1995hoo]

So is that supposed to mean "only one vehicle allowed in the crossover at a time", then?

I assume so–I interpreted it as meaning that if I pull into the crossover and turn partway to wait for an opening, you're not supposed to pull up next to me going in the same direction.

We very seldom go that way, but if we're on there again anytime soon I'll try to remember to get a picture.

[kphoger]

No, it means you're not allowed to wait for a break in traffic on top of another vehicle.

[J N Winkler]

I understood the message clearly enough, but it struck me as a fine candidate for "Cryptic word messages on traffic signs" because I'd wager that a lot of people seeing it for the first time are puzzled by it–and indeed my wife's reaction to the sign was that "DOUBLE STACKING" sounds like something to do with a fast-food hamburger.

I would not want to take the opposite end of that bet.  I actually had to read your post three times to form a reasonably clear idea of what the sign was meant to do:  prevent situations where two cars, coming from opposite directions, pull into the crossover at the same time to wait to complete their left turns.  Unless the road in question has a sufficiently wide median between the carriageways (and it sounds like this length of US 50 does not), each car blocks the other's sightlines, which makes it unsafe for the drivers of both cars to complete their intended turns.

A better solution to this problem (assuming there is little traffic on the side road that actually wants to cross US 50, as opposed to turning in one direction or the other) is to close the crossover and install Michigan lefts.

[1995hoo]

I'm not sure it's an "opposite directions" scenario because the side road is located solely on the south side of Route 50. Take a look at the Street View I linked and click down the road a bit to see the crossover.

But maybe I misunderstood the sign.

[J N Winkler]

I'm not sure it's an "opposite directions" scenario because the side road is located solely on the south side of Route 50. Take a look at the Street View I linked and click down the road a bit to see the crossover.

Yup, it is a tee junction (I didn't actually look at the StreetView extract until after I posted).  However, a vehicle on the side road wishing to turn left onto US 50 and using the crossover to divide the turn into two stages can easily wind up abreast of a second car on US 50 wishing to turn left into the side road.  It is a different route to the same undesirable result.

I think the same remedy--crossover closure plus Michigan lefts--would work here, but the underlying problem is that Virginia DOT allowed a major traffic generator to set up in one of the quadrants of this intersection.  There would not be a double-stacking problem if that development were simply not there.  Closing the StreetView window and looking at the mapping for this area, I see that it is rural but fairly densely settled, with at least one car dealership and a number of subdivisions (with direct access to US 50) within just one mile of the SR 28 cloverleaf.  If there is any intention to allow further development while preserving US 50's capability to handle through traffic without delay, pretty severe access management will have to be rolled out or US 50 will have to be upgraded to a freeway.

[Scott5114]

Off topic; not a cryptic road sign but an error message: "THE SPHINX IS ABSENT".

[1995hoo]

These parking signs are all over downtown DC. Lots of people get tickets because they don't understand the message. I'm interested in hearing you folks' interpretations. I know what the sign is intended to mean, but I don't think it conveys it well at all.

[agentsteel53]

7am to 6:30pm, Monday through Saturday: paid parking, limit of 2 hours.
6:30pm-10pm, Monday through Saturday: paid parking, unlimited time.
all times not covered above (nights and Sundays, effectively): free parking, unlimited time.

do I win a prize?

[1995hoo]

You are correct. For some reason DC writes tons of tickets to people who think the "no time limit" part means free parking (two local traffic reporters have confirmed this to me). I wonder if it's because that part of the sign is in a different color.

[Big John]

What does the sign above it say?  Looks like some sort of a no parking sign.  Not clear from the sign on what happens from 10PM-7AM and Sundays.  Agree that listed times are all paid parking.

[1995hoo]

No parking any time to the left of the sign. There's a commercial driveway there.

[kphoger]

Not ever having seen paid parking with no time limit, I would translate the sign thusly:

"However you interpret this sign, you might be wrong.  Give up.  Park somewhere else you know it's legal."