Abstract
After five years of experience with the Amsterdam city routes the author gives it as his opinion that they have no positive effect. The routes are being signposted from the motorways via the major arterials to the districts, the latter being identified by zone numbers derived from the Dutch GPO postal codes. The system seems to be super fluous for the local people and obscure for other road users. The reason may be that the planners have overestimated the human ability to handle numerical data and systems.