Question NW1589 to the Minister of Tourism

Reply:

Payment for the provision of tourist attraction signs is normally dependent on the policy of the relevant road, be it national, provincial or local authority. The road authority will, however, provide the necessary tourism signs for emergency services such as police stations or government hospitals. All other tourism signs for attractions or services are normally paid for by the owner/operator of the facility.

Factors taken into account in calculating the fee are as follows:

• text size on signs is dependent on the speed of the road thus a sign on a national road and a sign on a municipal road will differ in cost;
• the size of the sign determines the materials used and thus the manufacturing cost;
• the size of the sign will determine the number of poles needed to support the sign;
• a road signage team has to go out to erect the sign;
• should a sign be damaged it would need fixing or replacing (the lifespan of a sign is from 7 to 10 years).

BACKGROUND INFORMATION: EXPLANATION FROM DOT ON COMMENTS

Various roads are managed by various authorities. National roads are managed for the DoT by SANRAL; Provincial roads are managed in each province by that province and municipal roads are managed by the municipalities in which they occur. Thus you will find that within the borders of a certain province there will be national, provincial and municipal roads. Each of these authorities will have policies and/or legislation governing how roads are managed by the particular authority.

Tourism signs in the SA and SADC Road Traffic Signs Manuals are brown signs. As Police Stations and Government Hospitals are signed on brown signs they form part of what is called Tourism signs in the manual.

Whoever submits the request for the signage will be responsible for the cost of implementing the signage.

There is no average as the size of the sign dictates the cost. A large sign will cost more than a small sign. The road authority cannot put signs up which are not legible at the speed travelled on the road and small signs are not legible at 120 km/h.

SABS determines only the quality of the material to be used for the manufacture of the sign. The SA and SADC Road Traffic Signs Manual stipulate the type of material to be used. If the wrong material or inferior quality of material is used the sign will become illegible more quickly and have to be replaced more often and this will eventually increase the cost of the signage.

Most signs will require at least two poles. Sometimes the sign can be attached to an existing sign structure and then the cost of poles would not be relevant. Sometimes the sign might be large enough to warrant three poles in this case it might influence the cost.