Tag Archives: pedestrians

Grammarian Abroad

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Travel is enlightening — but also befuddling. Having just returned from vacation, I’m reliving my adventures by examining signs I spotted during this trip and others. I find myself more confused than ever. Here’s a sign posted on the window of a school in Venice:

Three lines are simple to decode: They teach English, French, and German. But what’s Inglese Postcoloniale? My translation app says “Postcolonial English.” Okay, which colony are we talking about? America after the Revolutionary War? Britain after the Empire morphed into the Commonwealth? A variety of English spoken in former Italian colonies?

Next is a sign my family spotted in Tokyo:

Does the collision occur only when the pedestrian is oncoming, or is an outgoing collision also possible?

Judging from this sign, pedestrians in London should certainly proceed with caution:

I’m all for Road Safety in London (and everywhere else), but killing pedestrians For your own Safety seems counterproductive.

Amid the confusion, I did find one perfectly clear sign:

Bravo, Madrid! Bravo, hotel owner! Even the most jet-lagged travelers, assuming they speak English, can understand this message. Would that all our communications were so easily decoded!

No decoding needed for this message: I wish you happy travels, on the road and in your dreams.

What I Meant Was . . .

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I think and also hope that what these signwriters think they said is different from what actually landed on the page. Or screen. Or metal sheet. Wherever! Take a look at this one, courtesy of my friend Don:

Someone killed 3 Pedestrians for my own Safety? Please let that not be true. Also, what will Repeat to cross other side? Homicide? And don’t get me started on the green man’s activity.

Another, which I spotted while obsessively checking apartment listings in my building to find out who’s moving:

I’m wondering which hairdresser the apartment owner went to for Coiffured Ceilings. I have to admit that my own ceilings have never been cut, dyed, or curled. However, they are coffered by support beams. Does that make me stylish enough?

Probably not. I do sometimes shop at a fancy grocery, where the food is better than the accuracy of the “best if bought by” date:

True, time is relative and certain portions of 2020 have seemed endless, but September 31st? Nope. Well, maybe if there’s a recount . . .

Where?

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If you feel your life lacks direction, take heart. None of these signs will help you, but they will show you that you’re not alone. The first example comes from my friend Ellie:

It’s hard to know where to begin my comments. “In Side” and “Use As Credit At Pump” caught my eye (caught as in “fish hook”). I admit I’m fond of “Inconvenius,” but it’s not a direction, so I’ll leave that and the apostrophe problems alone.

I snapped the next photo on a New York City bus that crosses Central Park:

“Traverse”? I don’t think so! “Traverse” is a verb, and anyway every New Yorker (except whoever wrote this sign) knows that the bus crosses the “transverse.”

This one is more a “who?” than a “where?” but it’s too good to pass up:

Nice to know that we “pedesterians” have a place to walk. At least the signwriter consulted an etiquette book (saying “please”), if not a dictionary or spell-check program. This signwriter did both:

I could question the capitalization rules applied here, but I behave Graciously. You should too.

Speling Is a Lost Airt

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I don’t normally bother to point out spelling errors in New York City signs, but every once in a while I can’t help myself. Why would someone have a sign professionally printed without running it through spell-check? I admit that spell-check is far from perfect, but still. A glance would have been enough to save this sign from over-consonance:

It would be nice to think that the sign-maker chose “dinning” to emphasize noise-level issues. I’ve often drowned a scarf in sauce while leaning over the table to catch one or two syllables. The background music and the shouts of other diners (dinners?) can be deafening! Alas, I don’t think that was the intention. On the plus side, the hyphens in “off-the-beaten-path” are correct.

Another instance of over-consonance:

When I saw this sign I immediately thought of Nagini, Voldemort’s pet snake. Read it aloud and listen for the hiss in “occassions.” I assume the sign-maker speaks Parseltongue, the snake language of the Harry Potter series.

The consonants are fine in this one, but not the vowels. The sign does, however, accurately reflect the feeling New York’s construction inspires in those of us navigating the city’s sidewalks:

If you’re overwhelmed after exiting the walkway, perhaps you’ll consider dinning out, with a sheet cake to mark the occassion.

Punc. Puzzles

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What governs whether a sign-maker has room for letters and punctuation? Font? The size of the sign? I’m going for chaos theory, based on these signs. The first is from the “Dept of Transportation”:

Somehow “ped” got a period, but “dept” didn’t. Both are abbreviations, “ped” being the shortened form for “pedestrian” and “dept” for “department.” In case you’re wondering (actually, despite the fact that you’re not wondering at all), I should mention that this NYC “dept” isn’t consistent when it comes to punctuation relating to walkers:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe the plural “peds” seems different to the dept? Grammatically, it’s not.

Not only “depts,” but also building owners get creative with punctuation:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Neither of the two sentences on this sign ends with a period. Also, “owners” should have an apostrophe, before the s or after it, depending upon how many people own the bikes. I gave up the apostrophe battle a long time ago, so I won’t dwell on that issue here. I do wonder (a) how the landlord can figure out who owns a bike and (b) exactly how the “expense” is collected. I’m betting this sign is an empty threat. (Also ineffective, given the number of bicycles that have nearly run me down on New York sidewalks. What’s the dept doing with the time saved by ignoring punctuation rules?) I also wonder about the criteria for capital letters in this sign. If standard rules for caps had been in effect, only “No” and “Removal” would qualify (first word of each sentence), as well as the “Ps” in the title, “Private Property.” If the caps were for emphasis, why is “expense” in lower case?

Another:

I understand that consistency is difficult to achieve in, say, a 200-page document. But if you’re working with only two sentences, you ought to be able to spare a period for each or omit the punctuation mark entirely.

Last but not least:

Okay, no period at the end of this sentence: I’m used to that. But I can’t find any reason for a comma before the conjunction “or.”  For that matter, I can’t find a reason for the text as written. Why not just say “DO NOT FEED BIRDS”? Theories welcome. Punc also.

Quick Questions

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I’m not going to ask whether it’s “hot enough for you,” the standard query in NYC during August. In deference to the fact that everyone’s brains are fried, I’ll just post a few signs and ask a simple question about each. Feel free to answer.

On a sidewalk near Second Avenue:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Question: Do they think pedestrians will hurdle over the orange-and-white bars without this reminder?

In a shop on the West Side:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Does the flu vaccine advertised in the small circle to the left of the larger sign complement the lipstick or the powder?

From The New York Times:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is “wildly unparalleled” a zig-zag or a right angle?

Finally, from a mini-golf course in Seattle:

Does this mean you should ignore the hand rails that are NOT provided?

Prize for the best answers is, well, nothing. But try anyway!

Illegal Words

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The scene: I’m chopping turnips and listening to my local public radio station. The action: The announcer promises an extended report on “illegal spying” after the break. The reaction: I spend the next ten minutes wondering if “legal spying” exists. The consequences: I  lose a thin slice of fingertip to inattention and have to rinse blood off the turnips. Denouement: I decide that “illegal spying” falls into the same category as “victorious traitor.” If you win, you control the language. That’s why no “traitor” ever gains power. A “traitor” who succeeds is a “rebel” or a “patriot” (see “American Revolution”).  So  James Bond isn’t engaging in “illegal spying” in the eyes of the British government. The nation spied upon, however, holds a different opinion. If James Bond gets caught, he goes to prison. Of course, James Bond never does get caught, not permanently anyway. Why ruin a franchise that reaps billions?

But I digress. This post isn’t about potboiler-blockbusters. It’s about legality and the words that describe it. Take a look at this sign:

P1010935 (3)

 

 

 

These words appear at a construction site, on the side of a shed that protects pedestrians from any falling debris. The ceiling of this shed is maybe twelve or fifteen feet high, level with the apartment windows on the second floor of the building. (How nice for the occupants! They can chat with construction workers over morning coffee.) Back to language: “burglary” is a legal term for breaking and entering a building in order to commit a crime. Okay, that word makes sense, because the shed could facilitate entry into those second-floor apartments. But “hold up”? This is an informal term for “mugging” or any robbery committed with a weapon.  Technically, the same bad guys sneaking through a window could “hold-up” the occupants, but this action is already covered under “burglary.” So why use both terms?

I didn’t lose a fingertip to this one, but I did speculate all the way home. Did the sign-maker envision armed robbers atop the scaffolding, taking wallets and jewelry from residents strolling on top of the shed? For a block or two I decided that the protection was for pedestrians under the shed – a sort of “walk through here and you’ll be safe” notice. Then I realized that “pedestrians” aren’t “premises.” So that theory bit the dust. At the end of the walk, I decided that another definition of “hold-up” worked best: “delay.” This company promises that the building will be “electronically protected” against missing sheetrock, striking workers, and four-hour lunch breaks. Now that is something worth paying for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey, I’m Walking Here! Part 2

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As a pedestrian in New York City, I generally feel that I am the lowest of the low, the bottom of the barrel, the – well, insert your favorite metaphor for “unimportant” here. Why? Stoplights are timed to move motor vehicles along, not to give me a chance to put one foot in front of the other and reach the other side of the avenue before the next wave of cars approaches. Bikes get their own lane on many streets and all too often, uninhibited and unticketed, dominate the sidewalk as well. And then I saw this sign:

I'm "traffic" now.

I’m “traffic” now!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I thought about the phrase “pedestrian traffic” as I plodded through the detour this “notice” required. According to the dictionary, the noun “traffic” means “vehicles moving on a road,” “dealing or trading in something illegal,” or “communications between people.” I am not a Ferrari, a drug transaction, or a text message. I am a person who travels via feet. So what does this sign really mean? If the first definition applied, I’d expect an upgrade in “pedestrian traffic” flow – lights timed to the average traveled-foot-inch per minute, for example. Nope. If the last definition applied, I’d expect the Department of Transportation to respond to the many cries for bike-free sidewalks. Nope again. So I’m choosing door number two. And I thank the DOT for banning trades of, say, one babysitter pushing a double-wide stroller for two guys with briefcases plus an oblivious texter to be named later.

Emboldened by this upgrade to “traffic” status, I went out again – and found this:

Wait where?

Wait where?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At the start of my first year as a teacher – and this is a true story – I questioned my principal about the schedule calling for me to teach two different classes at the same time on two different floors. Her answer? “Young people don’t want to face obstacles.” Oh. So too, at this corner, was I obliged to “wait” at two different places at the same time.

I won’t bother discussing the indignity of being a “ped.” It’s nice out. I’d rather take a walk.