This document discusses public signage and how effectively signs communicate information to people from different backgrounds. It analyzes a warning sign in Dutch that indicates a ferry landing is slippery when wet or frozen. While tourists from various countries could not understand the text, contextual clues and voices provided the meaning. The document argues public signs need quick interpretation without study in order to be effective for all audiences regardless of language or literacy. Examples from Macau and Hong Kong show how images and symbols can convey meaning even without text translation, though full understanding of individual rules may require language knowledge.

1. Public Signage

2. Take a moment to study this street sign from the Netherlands. Does
this sign inform you in any way? If so, what is it telling you? If not, why
not? Are there any contextual clues that might help?

3. The sign is posted at a ferry landing. You perhaps could tell that it is a
warning sign (red triangle with !). The wording reads:
Watch out (pas op). Slick! (glad!) with (bij) rain (regen) and (en) frost
(vorst).
Is there any way you or another tourist could have guessed that?
According to the voices heard on the landing, the passengers were
Japanese, Chinese, Italian, and American. And yes, it was slick with
frozen but melting rain water and frost. And yes, people slipped!

4. Signage is a means to communicate information
to others. Often public signage informs people of
rules, warnings, boundaries, directions, or
instructions. The information might range in
importance depending on one’s situation. And
although a sign might make perfect sense to the
sign designer, interpretation can be problematic—
even when pictures are included. Can you
decipher what each of these is trying to
communicate....

8. These are clearly signed on roadways. While perhaps we can figure them out
after a few moments of study or discussion, road signs aren’t for study and
discussion. Street signs and warnings such as these need to be designed so
that they can be seen, interpreted, and obeyed in an instant by whomever is on
the road, literate or not, of any age, and of any language background.

9. Now take a look at this sign from Macau. Nothing is in English. We
have Chinese and Portuguese here, but Macau is a place that is very
used to tourist and other visitors from foreign countries. Are you able to
understand the information here?

10. Words are often used to clarify, but much public signage
uses images and symbols to try to communicate meaning.

11. What about this one from Hong Kong? I don’t think I would have been able
to guess what each individual prohibition is without the English translation
(the “suction device” looks like a garbage can to me. I would have thought it
meant “no dumping garbage here”) but I would be able to get the overall
gist. Would this be enough information to prevent me from unwittingly doing
something that is against the law?