Traffic Regulations Quiz

A colleague of mine was briefly halting in front of this tree of traffic signs to jump into a shop while I stayed behing fascinated by this combination.

Quiz question 1: Did we obey to German traffic law?

Quiz question 2: What would be an easy way to get rid of one third of the signs, making the situation easier to understand, while keeping all rules in place?

Waiting for your suggestions ;)

Munich, Germany, M_20080204_180722

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Comments

Lars Trebing says:

Assuming that the timestamp of this image is correct, stopping the car here was highly illegal. :) And, of course, they could have used “bi-directional” signs for the left or right column to make the right or left column obsolete, but I doubt that this would really have made the situation easier to understand.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Birger Hoppe says:

Yea, 2 points! Both right, or at least: Also my opinion.
1. The photo timestamp is indeed correct: We've been there shortly after 6pm, thus, the area by that time was a no stopping area.
2. I was thinking of removing the signs on the left-hand side and instead changing the "arrow to the right" into an "arrow both directions".
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

anadelmann says:

Removing signs? What an absurd idea. This would completely destroy that little bit of symmetry that is in there. The signs have been put up for artistic reasons (obviously).
Wonderful that you've seen this. It really made me laugh.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

martinstelbrink says:

What an effort to say:
"You are allowed to park here between 19:00 and 22:00 and 5:00 and 6:30"... so basically for 4.5 hours each day. At least you can halt briefly during 6.5 hours each day. Not sure what drove these rules, but I don't have to understand each miracle of this world :-)
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Lars Trebing says:

I think that the reason behind these rules is not too complicated to figure out. This sign combination is very probably located at a street with two or more lanes for each direction, so that parking on the rightmost lane at night (when there is almost no traffic) is no problem, and briefly stopping there during moderate traffic time (e.g. to pick somebody up or to throw a letter into a mailbox) is allowed as well. Only during rush hour all the lanes are needed for circulation.

Plus, there is probably also some night club near this sign, and many of the people who leave it during the night have drunk too much to drive home on their own, so instead they’ll take a cab at this temporary taxi stand.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Birger Hoppe says:

Thanks for all the comments!
Yea...there indeed is a certain symmetry in there, which makes the sign artistic.
Regarding Lars' guesses: I am not yet too familiar with that particiular part of Munich (Freimann). My Geo-tag, which I added just now, might be slightly off. But indeed: The street was very wide, not sure if two lanes per direction, but definitely wide enough to have another car pass by parking cars.
I was also very much surprised by the taxi stand but couldn't figure out why there at that place is need for one. If there is a club it must be quite hidden. But good an idea indeed.
Martin: Minor addition: To the right of the sign you are even allowed to park all night long between 7pm and 6:30am, full 11,5 hours ;)
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Lars Trebing says:

I have found a shadow of such a sign combination about 230 meters eastwards—might it be that one? Though I know nothing about night clubs there either.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Birger Hoppe says:

Unbelievable! That's it!
Wow, man...what a research ;)
I've updated the geo-tag.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

canzonett says:

Wow, Lars Trebing. I almost waited for you to write "Elementary, my dear Watson". Brilliant combination.
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

martinstelbrink says:

To the right? Hmmm, my driving license may be a few years old (and so my theoretical lessons), but I always thought that the arrows in the "no parking" signs do not indicate the direction, but indicate whether the rule starts or ends at the sign. An arrow pointing towards the street means that the rule starts and an arrow pointing away from the street means it ends there. In this case the rule both starts and ends, which normally is indicated by the double-arrow pointing to both sides (as you suggested) and only used as a reminder as the stretch, where the rule is valid, may be quite long. The arrow underneath the Taxi sign would indicate the direction though. If they wanted to say the same with the "no parking" signs, then they would have needed white signs with an arrow (as with the taxi sign).

@Lars Trebing: I am equally impressed...both by the location and the interpretation, which is probably correct (though given the complexity I am not sure it really works out)
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Lars Trebing says:

It was quite elementary indeed. I just entered the coordinates in Google Earth, then I saw that there were distinct shadows of all signs there, so I thought that this combination should be recognizable, too. It took less than a minute to pan a bit eastwards and find it there.

By the way, I think that I also solved the taxi stand enigma. It seems that there is a night club there indeed, “Level 228” (formerly “Discothek A9”). In fact I already found it yesterday by searching Google for the appropriate addresses (Frankfurter Ring 224, Frankfurter Ring 226, and finally Frankfurter Ring 228) but their web site looked quite empty, so I wasn’t sure whether this one still exists. However, while walking around a bit in the city today and with a bit of yesterday’s research buried not too deep in my mind, I stumbled upon this:

… which gives me enough evidence to believe that they’re still in business.

By the way, they don’t really seem to care about their web site anyway—they did try to advertise it on their billboard but they got it so wrong that they actually printed an invalid domain name there. On the other hand, accurate URLs don’t seem to be too important in this business:

Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

Birger Hoppe says:

Hier geht was ab... ;)

@ Martin: When I was writing my 'minor addition' I couldn't decide between "to the right" (in terms of sides of the photo) and "in front of" (in terms of street orientation). But I believe both of us talk about the same thing: On the stretch leading up to the sign there is no designated taxi waiting area in the night and you can park your car all night long, while on the stretch after the sign you might be faced with quarrels with taxi drivers over who's allowed to park there in the timeframe 10pm - 5am. Would that settle that part of the quiz?

@ Lars: Great research once more! And I was thinking in this area the dog is frozen. (What German saying am I referring to? ;) Might still be true given the fact that you can gamble on half-priced bottles with the bar keepers...that tells me something about how busy the bar is ;)
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

martinstelbrink says:

ok, settled on my part :-)
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

zahn-i says:

german seltsamkeit
deutsche weirdness

punkt
Posted 23 months ago. ( permalink )

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Taken in Freimann, Munich (map)
Taken with a Canon Digital IXUS 850 IS.
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Taken on February 4, 2008
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Traffic Regulations Quiz

Comments

Lars Trebing says:

Birger Hoppe says:

anadelmann says:

martinstelbrink says:

Lars Trebing says:

Birger Hoppe says:

Lars Trebing says:

Birger Hoppe says:

canzonett says:

martinstelbrink says:

Lars Trebing says:

Birger Hoppe says:

martinstelbrink says:

zahn-i says:

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Birger Hoppe's photostream

Bits & Pieces (Set)

S!gns (Pool)

Munich, Germany (Pool)

Sign City (Pool)

guess where munich (please read the rules!) (Pool)

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