Road Narrows sign

Federal designation W5-1 in the MUTCD, the national standard every state signs to. Common where a road crosses an old bridge, causeway or narrow cut built to a smaller width than the highway on either side of it.

How to recognise it

This sign is a diamond stood on its point in yellow, the warning colour. Yellow diamonds telling you what the road is about to do. They are advisory rather than mandatory, but ignoring them is how people end up in ditches and how examiners end up failing you.

What the test wants you to know

Read the symbol carefully: unlike Lane Ends, both edges of the road move inward here and the lane count usually stays the same, so there is nowhere new to merge to. The tested response is reducing speed and centering the vehicle, not changing lanes.

The sign people confuse it with

Road Narrows gets mixed up with Lane Ends more than any other pairing in this category. Put them side by side and the difference is obvious, which is exactly why it is worth doing once rather than meeting them cold in the exam.

Road NarrowsThe road ahead becomes narrower on one or both sides, though no lane actually disappears

Lane EndsThe road narrows ahead and one lane will disappear

Practise it

Reading about a sign is not the same as recognising it in half a second with an examiner watching. Every state road signs test on this site shows the sign and asks you to name it, then shows four faces and asks you to pick the right one.

Take a road signs test