Station sign
Station sign used in Germany Kilometrierung of roads and road sections . In doing so, they take on the function of milestones . The position coordinates , street name , section number and stationing kilometers are usually displayed on station signs . Since the administration of roads and thus the station signs in Germany is mainly a matter for the federal states, the station signs vary from country to country.
Sometimes the term station sign is also used as an umbrella term for milestones and signs as well as the actual station signs.
purpose
Station signs have no meaning for the driver while driving, they are only used for orientation ( e.g. road maintenance ) and for quick and precise positioning when an accident is reported . For example, the emergency services and the police can quickly determine the location of the accident using the information on the station sign.
Types and colors
A common type of station sign is made of plastic and has the shape of a triangle prism . They are set up in such a way (or if there are guardrails attached to them) that one edge of the triangular prism runs parallel to the roadway .
The station signs usually have black text on a white background. The through-road stones have a yellow background in some federal states and a white background in some such as Schleswig-Holstein.
But there are also station signs in the form of small white metal signs on their own approx. 80 cm high metal mast, set up across the road.
In the North Rhine-Westphalian part of Rhineland , the station signs consist of white plastic posts with green caps, but yellow caps for OD stones. In town they are attached to houses or masts as white plastic signs.
If it is not possible to set up the station signs customary in the respective federal state, two signs, which are attached directly on top of one another and represent the two sides of the normal station signs, can be attached to house or tunnel walls, bridge railings, masts, etc.
In Rhineland-Palatinate , Lower Saxony , Schleswig-Holstein and Brandenburg , the station signs are attached to the delineator posts .
labeling
The most common type of labeling: On one of the two sides facing the street is the street number, on the other is the section number (in Schleswig-Holstein) - or in some federal states the numbers of the network nodes delimiting the section - and the number of kilometers (also called "station "") And sometimes other information, such as the coordinates of the installation site. The two sides alternate along the road so that drivers can see the road number and the number of kilometers alternately on the side facing them.
The variant in which the street number as well as the section and station are printed on both sides is also common.
Through town
The station signs are also available as OD stones in town through traffic . Instead of the street number, they are marked with "OD".
In some states, the station sign still wear one for Ortsdurchfahrten E or V . These indicate whether the respective (through-town) station sign is in the link (V) or in the development area (E). An example: If the station sign is outside a location (non-developed area), it is in the link area and the station sign bears "ODV". Most of the time, "ODV" station signs can be found at intersections in front of the site. If the (through-town) station sign is within a location, i.e. in the development area, the sign bears "ODE". If the access area and the connecting area alternate, the station sign has "E / V" or "V / E". In these federal states, "OD" without the addition "E" or "V" is only used if there is no link area and the (through-town) station sign is directly at the transition between the access area and the link area.
Advantages and disadvantages compared to milestones and signs
The advantage of the station signs over milestones and signs is that with the station signs, the mileage usually starts again at 0 at each intersection , while the normal mileage often goes through long distances. Therefore, if the length of the road changes due to re-routing of station signs, only a short section has to be provided with new station signs, while with normal kilometers a longer stretch of road has to be provided with new kilometer signs, or, which is often the case for cost reasons, missing kilometers (missing or duplicated kilometers) must be accepted. This is the reason why most of the federal states have switched to station signs in order to be able to react more flexibly to changes in the course of the road, to prevent obstacles to precise positioning such as missing kilometers and to save costs.
Due to these missing kilometers and the fact that with normal mileage no section numbers are given, but the mileage sometimes starts again at 0 and even changes direction in some places, a kilometer specification is usually not clear: Since the same kilometer number occurs more often (this is especially true on federal highways with lower numbers), the position cannot be inferred from the pure kilometers. Additional information is required for this, such as nearby locations; And even then, an exact determination of the position is not always possible, since the kilometer reading sometimes starts again at 0 even on the open road, so that, for example, kilometer number 1 can occur several times within a few kilometers. In the case of station signs, however, the exact position can be determined from the combination of street number, section number and kilometer number (station). This is particularly important in the event of an accident , since if you give precise information, the emergency services can be at the scene of the accident faster.
An important disadvantage of the station signs is the cost of introducing them, as all kilometer signs have to be replaced.
Disadvantages of the station signs could also be the poorer legibility compared to normal kilometer signs (especially if the station signs are attached to the delineator posts) and the lower durability, but these are not disadvantages of the station signs in general, but only of some types. These also apply to some types of mileage signs.
Finally, it is seen as a further disadvantage of station signs that the introduction of station signs means that the old milestones, some of which date from before the Second World War, lost their function and were largely removed.
foreign countries
In Switzerland, so-called reference point signs are set up on national roads, which contain relevant information such as road owner, road number, reference point number. These BP signs are not to be confused with the road signal 4.72 "Kilometer board ". The handling of cantonal roads is left to the cantons, with the result that some cantons put up such signs, others not.
Web links
- Federal Highway Research Institute: Administrative regulation "Instructions for road information database - network data" (ASB Netz); see Chapter B 2.11 ( Memento of March 11, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF file; 2.41 MB)
- Information on the station signs in Baden-Württemberg with an example
- Information on the station signs in Lower Saxony or on the new stationing with an example
- Information ( memento of February 12, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) on the station signs in Bavaria or on the new stationing with reference to the leaflet station sign
- Information on the station signs in Schleswig-Holstein or on new stationing with an example (PDF file; 128 kB)
- The station signs in action for the fire brigade and auxiliary staff
Individual evidence
- ↑ http://www.verkehrswacht-juelich.de/Tipps_-_Infos/body_tipps_-_infos.html#LVR
- ↑ Federal Roads Office FEDRO 2014: Road axes as a spatial basis reference system (RBBS) , pages 51–52
- ↑ Federal Roads Office FEDRO 2017: Materialisation and insurance of the reference points on the national highways