Signology: Hutong Signs

One of the lasting legacies of the Olympics is the number of (Chinglish free) bilingual signs that now appear throughout the city. While not quite Hong Kong, it's now a lot easier for people who can't read Chinese characters to do everything from take a bus, order a meal, find a public toilet, navigate the city's streets and delve into the capital's imperial past.

Just because the Games are over doesn't mean that Beijing has given up on becoming an international city, last week the city announced that 1,100 large bilingual street signs had been installed in visible locations within the Third Ring Road to help drivers navigate the city's hutongs. Although we hate dodging cars scraping along narrow lanes as much as the next Beijinger (when will they make NLGX a car-free zone?), we're in favor of the general trend of making Beijing streets more accessible to the non-Chinese literate.

Links and Sources
The Beijing News: 三环胡同双语指示牌
The Beijinger: Signology: New Bilingual signs for Beijing's Buses
The Beijinger: No More Chickens Without a Sex Life
The Beijinger: Public Toilets: Can you hold on for 10 minutes?
The Beijinger: Covering all the Bases

Comments

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that because bj subway has huge bueracracy problems!! X(

uu

Yeah the maps of the surrounding area in subway stations are utter crap and often wrong even on the new lines. They should take a look at the maps in Korea which are really really nice. Japan's are a bit too involved for me to expect China to copy them yet.

the subway maps and directions are still crap though.

It is very cool.
I who is a Chinese girl like it,
quite apart from foreigners who never
see before.
If I have enough time, I will bring my Camera having a walk through the street.
To snap every nice moment.

The new bus route maps are great, unfortunately they are only available in the central city. The only Chinese city I have seen that does it better is Chengdu where you find one large map with all the bus routes on it in different colors.

I oppose Calling Sanyuanqiao, Sanyuan Bridge. Pinyin should be preserved whenever possible so you know what to tell the taxi driver. In some instances Beijing Xi Zhan has been replaced with Beijing West Railway Station. Of course it is correct but without the pinyin how is a helpless foreigner going to tell a taxi driver that. Pinyin helps foreigners learn chinese!

As for NLGX, it should be car free north south from 12-12 Allowing shops to get deliveries in the morning. Perhaps the hours can be argued but I firmly believe that road access needs to be maintained in the future as more suppliers start to use trucks. They just need to be restricted to the morning.