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January 20, 2006 12:03 AM
Broken: Departure gates sign
Richard Sedley submits a picture of a sign taken at the Dusseldorf airport in Germany:
This sign appeared on a stairwell telling you that the departure gates were down the stairs.
It does make for an interesting icon, but can't say how helpful it would be if you were in a rush to find your gate.
While it is funny, it is obvious.
"This exit goes directly to the runway."
I.e. If you go outside it you will die
Lets see.....
What goes up must come down. Pride precedeth the fall.
Or the path down leads up, ultimately speaking. The path to greatness is found by walking in humility.
maybe it's like a subway compared to a train station; it's probably one of those new fangled underground airports.
I fail to see how this is broken... The symbol of the plane taking off is universal to all airports around the world, and the arrow is telling you where to go... It applies to actual takeoff, and departures. The arrow tells you were departures it... In all honesty, you'd have to be pretty dense to read it as literally as to understand it takes you to the runway.
I fail to see how this is broken... The symbol of the plane taking off is universal to all airports around the world, and the arrow is telling you where to go... It applies to actual takeoff, and departures. The arrow tells you were departures it... In all honesty, you'd have to be pretty dense to read it as literally as to understand it takes you to the runway.
I agree - the sign is fine, YOU're broKEn. Whatever little confusion there may be comes 100% from the American perspective; I don't think just germans, but 90% of the world, would understand this sign instantly.
In America we have signs written in english. In the rest of the world, which is a little more open-minded to people who speak different languages, symbol-based signs are standard.
Definitely not broken at all, and about as attractive as you can expect signage to be in an airport.
I think it would actually be quicker to understand than a written sign if you were in a rush to get to a plane.
There's nothing broken here. The signs say exactly what they should. The departure gate is downstairs.
So maybe it isn't broken but I found the first comments to be funny and entertaining and the last comments to be bitter and taking life too seriously.
yes, many signs in Europe are symbolic, as it is likely that several languages will be spoken in your location. My only question is as to the size of the sign. It seems small, which would make it difficult to read (and broken UI,,, but there are no reference points in the picture.
Otherwise, just fine
This sign would be after you've seen something directing you to the departure gates, when there might be little alternative, or maybe you're not supposed to go in the opposite direction. What they call "repeater" signage.
This sign would be after you've seen something directing you to the departure gates, when there might be little alternative, or maybe you're not supposed to go in the opposite direction. What they call "repeater" signage.
Tell you what is broken though:
"Invalid email address 'root@localhost.localdomain'"
That's a perfectly valid email address :o)
Bitter? Not particularly. Just that posting picture of a sign in another part of the world, which makes perfect sense to 99% of the people who encounter it daily (but not necessarily to Americans) is a reoccuring theme on TiB. (Incidentally, so are photos cropped to make a situation look more confusing then it really is.
No. (to the last comment)
To all you people who always complain about signs in America not being multi-lingual enough, you should see the Atlanta Airport. Almost everything that doesn't have a symbol with it is printed in 6 or more languages. The trains display stops on overhead screens in a lot of languages (English, Spanish, French, German, Korean, Japanese, Arabic, two types of Chinese (I think), and Hindu (again, I think; it looks like Hindu, but I'm no linguist). We should just solve the whole language barrier thing by printing signs in Esperanto. JK; that would work about as well as printing them in Lithuanian. Oh, and for your information, most of you missed the point. The sign is funny because it depicts an airplane next to a down arrow, which suggests an airplane going down.
It's obvvious how to read the signs. It's disturbing how easily the alternative interpretation is that your plane is going to crash. Not very comforting even if you know what they mean. They could have done a better job. The down arrow could have stairs in addition to the arrow. BROKEN.
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No man, the signage is telling you all planes will crash.
Posted by: I'm so funny at January 20, 2006 12:44 AM