It might be a catchy way of drawing attention attention to the product but the spate of those idiotic, upside down advertisements sponsored by Personalised Plates Queensland (PPQ) beggars belief.PPQ's latest upside down advertising sign is in a 90kph zone adjacent to the Ipswich Motorway at Redbank - 25km west of Brisbane - where 100,000 drivers a day have to twist their heads like rubber-necking professional contortionists to read the inverted advertisement for personalised number plates.
Even if drivers try to decipher the upside down wording from their normal driving position, they can be unduly distracted by a such a sign.In an area notorious for its high accident rate, it is incomprehensible that PPQ Queensland would claim on its website http://www.ppq.com.au/ to be "Proudly Supporting Queensland Road Safety" when the upside down advertising signs simply induce drivers to strain their necks upside down or back to front - just to read a sign featuring the official drunken, no-hoper of Springfield - Homer Simpson.
This section of the Ipswich Motorway is soon to be upgraded to six lanes by the State Government and will become even more dangerous when it is a construction zone.
PPQ should set a real road safety lead and immediately ban these unsafe, upside down billboards. At a time when we should be encouraging drivers to keep their eyes on the road, why has PPQ embarked on an advertising campaign which is nothing but an extraordinary distraction for drivers.What a furore there would be if someone caused a serious accident and claimed they were distracted by this upside down billboard.
Heads would roll and changes would be made within 24 hours.
PPQ should not wait for a tragedy to happen. They should get on the front foot by scrapping these woeful and potentially accident-causing, upside down billboards.
They should then sack their advertising agency for creating such a monumental stuff up.Have they considered the possible consequences of this type of signage?
Alternatively, they could follow the Tasmanian model where the State Government has banned all billboards from the State's highways, allowing only directional and information signage - resulting in a safer and less-cluttered environment with drivers no longer constantly bombarded with advertising trivia.
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