Haiku for Those Who Baiku

I'm in favor of promoting poetry through unusual methods and via surprising usages of it. But I think the city of New York's Department of Transportation may have gone a little far in using haiku signs to promote traffic safety.

Consider, for example, this sign:

Or perhas this one:

By the time you figure out what you are being warned against, you may have created a different safety hazard by blocking traffic while reading and pondering, or drifting into bicycle traffic to get a better look at the sign.

Click on this link at the New York Observer blog to see more of these interesting safety haiku paired with visual images that may cause more problems than they solve. (Shout out to my Osaka-based friend Tracy for making me aware of this article.)