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Countries and overseas territories with the same road lay-out and road signs

27K views 98 replies 33 participants last post by  Road_UK 
#1 ·
I have a particular interest in road lay-out and road signs between different countries and territories. For my own experience I have only driven in one complete different area of Britain: Gibraltar. It´s an experience. Even though they drive on the right, and all speed limits are in kilometres, road signs and lay-out are exactly the same as in Britain. I also would like to see more pictures and comparisons of the Falklands and Hong Kong for example. Also I believe a lot of north-African countries use the French system, as well as French Guyana, while Dutch (ex) overseas territories use a mixture of their own based on Dutch influence.
I have noticed that the Greek motorway system virtually has a German road lay-out with German style signs in a different colour.
And Finland seems to copy the Swedish style.

I want to know more!
 
#7 ·
Many former French colonies in Africa use signs that are very much based on the French style of signposting. The English style of signposting has not really been exported to former colonies. Belize (former British Honduras) was one of the very last dependencies to gain independence, but its signposting looks more American than British.

Within Europe and throughout the world, I think that you can speak of a few "spheres of influence". Countries are simply playing copycat. Some of them were already mentioned, but here are some others:

- Albania largely mirrors Italy
- Ireland is strongly UK-influenced
- Newer Dutch motorway signage is pretty much copied from Germany
- Bolivia has copied Chile
- A few Central American countries (Guatemala, Honduras and others) have devoloped one shared system of signposting. Which is very much based on the Mexican system.
- Australia and New Zealand hold shared standards (but differences remain)
- and of course there are the systems shared between former USSR republics, former Yugoslav republics and the Czech and Slovak Republics.
 
#11 ·
They are not colonies but just regions. Balearic, Canary islands and Ceuta and Melilla use the same system than in the rest of Spain.

In the case of Ceuta I show the typical EU signal advicing that border was 1 km ahead (yeah... most of territory is near the border but there is only one road from city to the custom control cabin at the border)

In the case of one island at Canary, they told me that it was very unusual to have road-shoulders. That made maximum 90 km/h in almost all the roads in the island.

The "point driving licence" used in Spain applies there as in other territory with no exceptions.
 
#13 ·
When I look at the NZ highways thread I think what influences they got from each Australian state.

Victoria - blue/gold tollway signs
NSW - Auckland CBD traffic lights look the same as Sydney CBD traffic lights
WA - yellow traffic light poles in suburban Auckland look the same as Perth traffic light poles.

I'm still working on the other state/territories...

New Caledonia heavily influenced by France
(Western) Samoa influenced by NZ and Australia
American Samoa influenced by United States
 
#16 ·
When I look at the NZ highways thread I think what influences they got from each Australian state.
Practices elevated to "Australian Standard" are often also elevated to an NZ standard. You'll find a lot of official NZ websites that refer to Australian Standard 1742, which is the Australian signing standard.

A problem in Australia is, however, that AS1742 is not very conclusive and leaves options, which causes differences between states and territories that are visible to everyone. And then you have NZ that kind of "operates" between those Australian states and territories, for the simple reason that they have to choose between the points left open by AS1742 in the same manner as the Australian states and territories have to.

g.spinoza said:
It would be interesting to know if former Italian colonies in Africa (Lybia, Ethiopia and Somalia) share similar signs to the Italian ones. Probably not, since decolonization there happened after mass motorization.
I'm sure that I have seen signs from Libya and Ethiopia, yet they do not resemble anything Italian.
 
#15 ·
And Finland seems to copy the Swedish style.
That is not quite true. The influence is 2-way. For example, the blue backround on the direction signs was in use in Finland before Sweden made updates to their palette. The original Swedish colour was very dark blue, almost black. The signs marking the beginning and the end of a populated are was taken into use first in Finland.

Even if the systems are rather similar, there are clear differences in fonts, arrows, layout, shapes, colouring, symbols, etc. Even a Finnish moose differs from the Swedish one... A few signs in use in Finland are not in use in Sweden, and vice versa. Of course, there is much coordination between the countries.



Swedish and Finnish versions: The warning signs in Finland have yellow band at the edge, and the corners are sharper. The animal is different.



No warning sign about tunnels in Finland, only the informatory version.



Different colours



Different way to express the span of the sign.



Arrowheads



Arrow shape



Bus lane




Layout



White on blue road number signs in Sweden



Road class indicated by the sign color in Finland
 
#21 ·
That is not quite true. The influence is 2-way. For example, the blue backround on the direction signs was in use in Finland before Sweden made updates to their palette. The original Swedish colour was very dark blue, almost black. The signs marking the beginning and the end of a populated are was taken into use first in Finland.


Road class indicated by the sign color in Finland
Sorry I deleted half of your post in the quote there, thank you for clearing that up. Road lay-out on motorways is virtually the same though, don´t you agree?
I really love your country, been there loads of times in my van. Always take the Silja Line ferry from Stockholm to Helsinki, do my delivery in Salo at the Nokia plant, get back to Helsinki and do lots of shopping.
 
#22 ·
Looking at the Nordic countries, you surely see large degrees of overlap. Sweden and Finland using the same font and some comparable signage. The route shields with dotted border are all over the Nordics, and there are some more. But it's a long way from "pretty much the same" in a manner comparable to Oz and NZ, France and some of its former colonies etc.

Regarding Russia, I have never seen signs from the far East, but all signs that I have seen, it seems like there has always been a fairly consistent approach throughout the former USSR. So that would be all the way to Vladiwostok.
 
#23 · (Edited)
What to think about Luxembourg?

When I passed Luxembourg, it seems they have a mix of French, Belgium and German styles.

French: bleu highway signs and a white exit-sign (only different is the names aren't written in capital letters like in France)
Belgium: sum (fork)arrows looked like as in Belgium
German: yellow signs (non-highway)
 
#25 ·
Signage in Andorra pretty much mimics Spanish standards. There are some endemic signs due to the particular layout of some roads (the whole CG-1, for instance, looks like a set of experiments for traffic management), and the font is a bit different, but both standards are impossible to differentiate for a non-specialist.

Same for Monaco, where they copied the French standard.
 
#36 ·
Cuban in-city signs are exactly the same as in Spain. Same font, same colour coding, same symbols:
That's certainly true for those signs that you posted and for one or two others signs that can be found in Havana. But the rest of Cuba leaves a scattered picture. Signage is scarce in the first place, signage less than 30 years old even more scarce. At least that was the case in 2005. And while the newer signs had some similarities to Spanish signs, that was about it. For one, motorways were signposted in green.

My takeaway at the time was that the contract to signpost Central Havana was won by a Spanish company (or granted as a form of aid), following which that company simply placed signs as he was used to at home. Also in light of a lack in clear local guidelines. You see that in parts of Africa too, for instance where you see one or two "South African" signs in Nigeria between other signs in all sorts of styles.
 
#38 ·
Is it possible than at Liechtenstein, Andorra, San Marino, Monaco, they are so similar to the neighbour country just because they will buy there the signals?
 
#49 ·
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