Monday 17 October 2011

Prohibited

I'm now safely back from Vienna (I've actually already been on another trip since I got back, but you'll have to wait to hear about that) and I've still got a few things I want to blog about. So firstly we have a couple of street signs both of which were seen within walking distance of Stephansplatz in the centre of the old city.
Now I'm going to assume that the red strip signifies a prohibited action but I'm a little confused as to what those actions are. At a guess the sign on the left means something along the lines of "no ball games in the street". As for the second sign, I'm torn between "no couples allowed" or maybe "no prostitution" (no idea what the law on that is in Austria) but neither really seems convincing. I'd love to hear your (imaginative) interpretations!
18 October 2011 at 09:36 , Graham Edwards said...

The first sign surely breaks the first rule of signage that a sign should be immediately and correctly understood. When one has to stop and work it out then it is surely deficient. I wouldn't like to hazard a guess on the second one. Your interpretation is probably as good as anything I'm likely to think of. It's the hands on hips of the man that puzzles me. I wouldn't have thought that anyone after a prostitute would be standing like that. But what would I know?

18 October 2011 at 20:02 , Scriptor Senex said...

It's obvious - midi and full length skirts only allowed on this street. i.e. no mini-skirts. (I think the man is superfluous.

21 October 2011 at 20:04 , Mark said...

It turns out (as usual) that Wikipedia actually has the answer as to what the signs mean. Strangely the red strip doesn't signify prohibited but rather the end of something.

The first sign means that you have reached the end of a residential street and the second that you have reached the end of a pedestrian zone. I have to say that given where I photographed these examples I think they were misplaced!

Post a Comment