It is a quarter past midnight as you coast down Whampoa Drive. Traffic on the street, although sparse, is slow due to the area’s Silver Zone scheme with elderly-friendly road safety measures.
Then, something blue in the distance catches your eye, growing larger and clearer as your car approaches. What seemed like a flat object at first is slowly morphing into something else.
Don’t worry, though. These aren’t eerie UFOs but ingenious 3D traffic calming road markings that appear to pop up on the roads. They were first piloted in December 2018, as part of the Land Transport Authority’s (LTA) efforts to create safer roads and to find out if motorists’ speed will remain slower over time.
Inspired by 3D traffic markings in Japan, these markings help to lower travelling speed in places such as residential areas with a high proportion of senior residents or slip roads from expressways.