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In Spain, more precisely in the Basque Country, I have seen letters "R" and "E" before parking slots.

What do they mean / stand for?

R E R E R This one is in the town of Zumaia. Picture is taken on Google Street View.

hippietrail
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Neusser
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    Perhaps the exact location might give a clue? – Berwyn Mar 28 '18 at 15:16
  • @Berwyn Added.. – Neusser Mar 28 '18 at 15:20
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    My guess is Estacionamiento Residentes, but it's purely a guess – Berwyn Mar 28 '18 at 15:31
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    my guess is the direction that the car should park... – Marcel P. Mar 28 '18 at 15:57
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    @MarcelP. this was my first guess, but the same letters show up in places where there's parking spaces on both sides of the road, as well as where parking spaces are perpendicular to the road, so that doesn't quite fit. – jcaron Mar 28 '18 at 16:50
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    @jcaron I can only assume that Marcel was joking, based on the fact that the first three cars alternate in direction in the photograph. It would be ludicrous for the city council to require cars parked at the kerb to be parked in alternating directions: the only sane options are "park whichever way you want" and "park facing the same way as the traffic." – David Richerby Mar 29 '18 at 08:51
  • @DavidRicherby: The road on the photo appears to be wider, but for narrower (one driving lane + one parking lane in total) roads with two-way traffic, "the traffic" can indeed go both ways. – O. R. Mapper Mar 30 '18 at 21:03
  • @O.R.Mapper Sure but it would still be ludicrous to reserve alternating parking spaces for cars facing in each direction. – David Richerby Mar 31 '18 at 08:56

1 Answers1

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According to the Zumaia website:

There will be 3 parking areas:

  • Resident area (painted white with the letters R and E)
  • Areas of high rotation (A, B and C: painted blue and red)
  • Half-stay area (painted blue)

(Google translation, emphasis mine).

Note that this seems to be in use in some other places. Other cities make extensive use of blue-and-red, blue-and-green and whatnot.

Just to complete the consequences of those innocent letters:

Resident area:

Only people with a resident card can park here.

jcaron
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    So is there any difference between the E and the R spots? – Paŭlo Ebermann Mar 28 '18 at 18:50
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    @PaŭloEbermann it seems to be just an easy scheme to alternate the letters at a decent distance from one another... – jcaron Mar 28 '18 at 20:23
  • I for one would like to know what the E stands for. Certainly the R is for residente(s), but I can’t figure out what the E is for. It’s certainly not for zona. The only "e"-word that jumps out in the article is estancia, but that doesn’t seem to connect up with the residential part. – tchrist Mar 29 '18 at 02:43
  • Perhaps E is for the second letter of "residente"? The way they alternate they seem to abbreviate the word... – Reinstate Monica Mar 29 '18 at 02:59
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    As suggested by @Berwyn it’s probably Estacionamiento Residentes – jcaron Mar 29 '18 at 04:29
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    @jcaron Yes, the "e" stands for estacionamiento. So E (estacionamiento) R (residentes). – Shirkam Mar 29 '18 at 06:58
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    "Other cities make extensive use of blue-and-red, blue-and-green..." This brings to mind a basic concept I learned about Web accessibility: don't convey important information using color alone as many people are color-blind. – Michael Benjamin Mar 29 '18 at 11:16
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    If you look at the Basque version of the page, the Resident's card is referred to as "Egoiliar Txartela", so maybe the "E" is for "Egoiliar" (later spelled as "Egoilar"). – Tom Fenech Mar 29 '18 at 13:15
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    Please note that the white zone is for loading and unloading passengers only. There is no parking in the red zone. – Robert Columbia Mar 29 '18 at 15:43
  • I'll vote for "egoiliar"/"egoilar" too (Google translate suggests one might be an adjective "resident" and the other a noun "resident", for what that's worth). – user38879 Mar 30 '18 at 00:45