Should we have bi-lingual road signs

The debate as to whether we should have bi-lingual road signs has risen again.

tfitzgerald

no we should just have the signs in irish

mike65

Has it?

Bi-lingual in which sense, a return to Gheill sli painted on the road?

L1011

No - Irish placenames only everywhere

If we're to have them bilingual, they should be bilingual EVERYWHERE. We've two official languages and we shouldn't be able to pretend the most used one doesn't exist in certain areas - particularly those where we get the laughable situation of 95% of business (or more) having solely English signage while there are Irish language only road signs. Barna and Dungloe come to mind.

mike65

Ah but the langauge fascists in every Gaeltacht area would be up in arms if you suggest true parity. They aren't interested in that sort of thing.

Judgement Day

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

NO! - It would be another waste of limited resources. Every time that I pick up a bilingual Govt/Local authority/semi-state document I see red. It is a waste of money (paper + printing), environmentally wasteful on the same basis and, in this age of print-on-demand, unnecessary! :mad:

Random

No - Irish placenames only everywhere

We should have English roadsigns only.

This doesn't mean I think we should take down all the old roadsigns, we should just print the new ones in English and over the years the Irish will phase it's way out.

Run_to_da_hills

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Bring back the imperial sign posts.

Breezer

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Absolutely. But it'd be nice if the county councils learned to spell the Irish (and in some cases the English) place names.

louth87

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Absolutely fine as they are, now way should they be only one or the other. only problem in Ireland is a complete lack of roadsigns in the first place!

Breezer

Yes - different fonts

Breezer wrote: »

A prize will be awarded to the person who can, in 10 words or less, explain how 'Dick' is short for 'Richard.' .

Richard's nickname is Rick and Rick's rhyming nickname is Dick

Colm R

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Deleted User wrote: »

Richard's nickname is Rick and Rick's rhyming nickname is Dick

I once saw an anti drink driving sign in Cork. It went like this.

Dick drank
Dick drove
Dick died
Don't be a Richard

Colm R

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

On topic, I am happy with the way the signs are. Weird, but I'm a little proud of it really.

I think the issue though is consistency, or rather the lack of it, when it comes to road signs.

KTRIC

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

The street signs in Ireland are a joke. If you're in an unfamiliar area you have to look at the corners of all the buildings to see the street signs , this is dangerous when driving.

Most other countries have them on the street corner.

topper75

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, different colours

Another bilingual region I am familiar with, Catalonia, uses same font and colour for Catalan and Spanish. Works well and provides parity. Can't see why they did what they did here with the different fonts. They probably just see Gaeilge as a hertige thing and have no ambitions for it to be restored as an everyday language of the people.

I agree that the real issue though is lack of signage and I totally support the poster who suggested signing streetnames on the corners rather than on buildings.

Breezer

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

topper75 wrote: »

I agree that the real issue though is lack of signage and I totally support the poster who suggested signing streetnames on the corners rather than on buildings.

+1. I'm actually just back from Germany and the difference it makes is unbelievable.

Cheeble

Doesn't this debate belong in the Gaeilge (Irish) forum?

KTRIC

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Cheeble wrote: »

Doesn't this debate belong in the Gaeilge (Irish) forum?

not unless we are going to continue as Gaeilge.

Sponge Bob

What debate ?? Someone publishing a poll is not a debate , it is a poll.

Leave them in Irish Only .

murphaph

There's an obvious option missing from the poll:

Irish signage only in Gaeltacht areas (already in place, albeit with the horrible italics) and english signage only in english speaking areas.

I can cope with An Spideal or Na Forbacha etc. so I'm sure the irish speakers (who also all speak english fluently-more than can be said for my irish) can cope with Dublin and Cork without requiring Ath Cliath and Corcaigh translations (yes of course the english names are actually translations from irish but newsflash-99% of the country does NOT refer to these places in irish).

If we introduced this we could also dispense with crappy italics in the Gaeltach and give the irish signage there an appearance becoming of an area where irish is actually the primary language. We could also scrap the use of all capitals on the signage in the english speaking parts and have a common font (mixed case font of some sort, easier to read hence the UK/US/Germany etc. all use mixed case fonts).

Calina

Gruffalo is on holiday from Commuting and Transport for a week.

Any further off topic posting from here on out - that is anything other than the place of Irish on a roadsign will result in a 7 day ban. Off topic includes individuals linguistic abilities or the place of Irish in general in society or the semantics of native versus mother language. If this thread gets any more fractious it will be closed.

OP I don't know where this debate has arisen again. Perhaps before issuing your poll you could perhaps have linked to where this debate has arisen.

The rest of you should bear in mind that I'm not afraid to close down discussions that descend into puerile name calling.

Calina

Yes - different fonts

Calina wrote: »

OP I don't know where this debate has arisen again. Perhaps before issuing your poll you could perhaps have linked to where this debate has arisen.

From "poor road signage pictures"

G_R

No - Irish placenames only everywhere

i agree with the idea of Irish signs in Gaeltachct areas and English Signs everywhere else.

its a waste of ink, metal and time having them dual languages. I mean, can anyone honestly say that while driving along the road, say to them selves ah Ath Cliath is only another 30km away???? And if for some bizarre reason someone does, then im sure it wont kill them to read the signs as bearla.

dannym08

Yes - different fonts

dannym08 wrote: »

i agree with the idea of Irish signs in Gaeltachct areas and English Signs everywhere else.

its a waste of ink, metal and time having them dual languages. I mean, can anyone honestly say that while driving along the road, say to them selves ah Ath Cliath is only another 30km away???? And if for some bizarre reason someone does, then im sure it wont kill them to read the signs as bearla.

Irish language studants. while they try to remember the Irish for 30!

fh041205

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

Breezer wrote: »

Absolutely. But it'd be nice if the county councils learned to spell the Irish (and in some cases the English) place names.

Absolutely. It would also be nice if they researched the irish placename instead of making it up.

L1011

No - Irish placenames only everywhere

fh041205 wrote: »

Absolutely. It would also be nice if they researched the irish placename instead of making it up.

Problem with researching it is that the Ordnance Survey have usually made up something far worse! Wasn't that long ago that there was an "Innfield" on the N4 on most maps...

Pineapple stu

No - English placenames only everywhere

It works fine in Wales so why not here?

Sponge Bob

Welsh place names are frequently very very long , you cannot expect the average Irish civil servant to hold their attention over words longer than 20 letters .

This , of course, would be an interesting test for some of them as part of an Bord Snip

Micilin Muc

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

A report on bilingual road signs by Rain Design Partners was commissioned by Conradh na Gaeilge.

I haven't seen this report yet but I believe that it's conclusions are that the current design of road signs in Ireland was not designed with international best practice in mind.

There are numerous factors that go in to the design of bilingual road signs: road-safety and colour-blindness being two of them. I'll try and get my hands on a copy and will post a link.

jamesnp

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, different colours

I've seen the rain design report and the author of that report has some of his ideas on his design blog at http://www.garrettreil.ie/.

Some of his observations apply equally to legibility of the English on our signs as well as the Irish. Basically he concludes that, it's a well known fact that Italics indicate something secondary - not acceptable under Official Languages Act. Italics themselves are hard to read and make the Irish illegible. English in caps makes the ENGLISH less legible. The fonts used are far from ideal.

He concludes, regardless of English v. Irish debate the signs in this country are very very difficult to read which results in the last minute dangerous decisions been taken by road users. He's designed a new font, specifically for Irish Road signs, called "Turas" which is specifically designed to enhance legibility of Irish and English. He proposes the first language (Irish) be in yellow and the second language be in White, equal weight, same font.


In my opinion there is no debate on the issue. The constitution and Official Languages Act are clear that Irish is the first language. Anything issued by government (including local authorities which have authority for road signs) must be (A) IN IRISH ONLY or (B) IN IRISH WITH AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION. There is no ability to have English only signs. Also, Irish must appear first, and must be at least be as legible as the English, ie, no italics, no abbreviations. At the moment, there is an exemption for road signs in the act, though this is time-limited. The chance of this legislation being revoked/amended is virtually non existent due to our obligations under EU legislation, where Irish is an official language. (See case of Teacher vrs. Ireland re. warnings on tobacco products, the EU forced the government to have bilingual warnings in both official languages of the territory). Official status at EU level will not be revoked because some Irish people have reservations over the cost of implementation.


So, the debate is moot, but as Garrett Reil says, we should look at this as an opportunity to get our signs up to scratch in all regards, and not just as an exercise for the national language.

On a personal note, people consistently point to the cost of implementation... The reason cost will be inflated is due to the negligence of government after government in this country. This work was already done on a phased basis from 1922 and through peoples ineptitude and lack of legislation, it was allowed to fall back. The Official Languages Act means we will [be forced] to do this once, we will do it correctly, and we will only pay once. Costs will be reduced by this legislation.

Question: If there was a constitutional referendum tomorrow on article 8, would Irish people vote to remove Irish as the first language? I seriously doubt it. In which case, we need to finally get the thumb out and implement something which we supposedly support.

-jp

Micilin Muc

Yes - but with the same font for both languages, same colour

jamesnp wrote: »

He's designed a new font, specifically for Irish Road signs, called "Turas" which is specifically designed to enhance legibility of Irish and English. He proposes the first language (Irish) be in yellow and the second language be in White, equal weight, same font.

The new font looks great. I wonder how open the Minister for Transport is to using Garrett's ideas.