Normative Signs: The Poetry of "Ought"

Here’s a sign at Philadelphia International Airport, which seems to suggest that the world is a very scary place. All sorts of things are apparently seriously dangerous, including wheelchairs, walkers, and (gasp!) open-toed footwear.

Of course, the dangers become more plausible once you see that the sign is located next to (but doesn’t actually refer to) a moving sidewalk.

Thanks to Wayne Norman for yet another pic.

Here’s a nice emotional plea, aimed at getting drivers to slow down in a construction zone.

The picture was taken in Markham, Ontario (just outside Toronto). Thanks to Charles for the photo.

Here’s a nice one, located at Tommy Thompson Park on Toronto’s Leslie Spit.

I like the rhyming, as well as the way the snake graphic is integrated into the text.

Thanks to Scott Gavura for the picture.

Here’s a sign advising motorists to do something of the need to do something they obviously will want to do anyway: switch lanes to avoid an immovable pile of streetcar rails, currently being stored in the right-hand lane.

Ignoring this advice is not impossible. At least not for those with a death wish.

This is Ossington Avenue in Toronto, by the way.

This sign is at the Royal York Hotel, Toronto. It’s a pretty common sign, often found on the complex doorways of hotels, universities, office buildings, etc. For climate control reasons (as some signs like this make clear) they want you to use the revolving door, rather than the swinging door that is much more likely to allow in a gust of cold / hot / etc wind.

Such signs can be mildy irritating, especially since you generally end up reading them as you’re just about to do something other than what they’re asking you to do.

Also worth noting: if you look below, you see the sign actually appears twice, which gives the whole thing a lovely air of onomatopoeia. Say it out loud: “please use revolving doors, please use revolving doors, please use revolving doors….”

Thanks to Yoni Freedhoff for sending the pic!

I hesitate to start a new category (new for this blog) of normative signs that have been modified (enhanced? defaced?).

Here’s a STOP sign that has had the name of Canada’s Prime Minister added. It’s worth noting, I suppose, that this modification does little or nothing to change the impact of the stop sign itself.

Should we call this “norm jamming,” by way of analogy to culture jamming?

(Thanks to Sheldon Wein for the picture.)

This one is in Washington, DC. (That’s the Capitol in the background.)

Exactly what’s being demanded here seems to depend on how you parse the sentence. Is it “You must [push the call button and thereby call for walk signal] before daring to cross the street”, or is it merely “You must push the call button IF you want the walk signal”?

Thanks to Wayne for sending this.

This sign is posted at a university gym. This is another one of those signs that you just know must have an interesting history. (This is something I point out to my business students: any regulation has a history, and it’s worth pausing to consider just what that history might be, what conflict led to the rule, etc.)

Also interesting that they’re appealing to health concerns, here, rather than to basic etiquette. (How likely is it that the health claim made here is based on anything like hard evidence?)

Thanks to Joe Desjardins for the photo.

This sign was sent to me by one of my MBA students, who pointed out that, if taken seriously, this sign — posted on a building just less than 9 metres from Dundas St. in Toronto — would require smokers to stand in the street.

I like especially emphatic normative signs. This one pulls no punches: Be careful, here, because this gate can cause serious injury or death.

And in addition, this sign features a truly brilliant icon representing some dude getting crushed by…well, crushed by a box with an arrow in it, which I suppose represents the aforementioned lethal gate.