New Haiku Signs Will Make NYC Streets Safer Through Power Of Poetry

DOT uses / Money from drunk driver fines / To buy new haikus! Today DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan unveiled the first of 216 safety signs featuring colorful artwork and haikus. The signs will be installed at a dozen high-crash locations near cultural institutions and schools citywide, using state money collected from DWI fines. Haikus for safer streets! We can't wait to hear what cantankerous NY Post columnist Steve Cuozzo has to say about this! ("In the good old days / Cars ran poets down like dogs / Wrote rhymes with their blood.")

The DOT hopes that the "Curbside Haiku" initiative will draw attention to "the critical importance of shared responsibility among all street users to help keep New York City's streets as safe as they can be." The series features 12 designs with accompanying haikus by poet John Morse, each one expressing a different safety message by focusing on one transportation mode. For example, our favorite one spreads this message: "Cyclist writes screenplay / Plot features bike lane drama / How pedestrian."

Half of the signs will be hung in pairs, with the image and haiku text appearing; the others feature an image with a QR code on the sign that lets New Yorkers "discover the safety message via their smart phones." They'll be displayed from now until next fall at a dozen hubs across the five boroughs; there's a map below showing where each haiku awaits you. Collect each one!