Grasping The Obvious

Each morning on the way to work, part of my transit takes me from Kennedy subway station on the RT into Scarborough Town Centre, where around the terminal, two or three large buildings are under construction, condos probably. On one site, I always take note of the signs halfway up the towers on the two large construction cranes.

On one crane, the sign says: Crane 1.
On the other, the sign says: Crane 2.

Now, I can well understand the need to label the cranes. If, say, you're given the task of taking something up to one of the crane operators, the foreman can say, "take this to Crane 1". And since both cranes look fairly similar, and it can get a bit disorienting on a construction site, it's useful to have that distinction, that label. And it makes more sense than calling them by non-numerical names, like Betty or Dave. Names can be easily forgotten.

But I wonder about the necessity of labelling them *CRANE* 1 and *CRANE* 2. Is there perhaps a danger some worker will confuse them with, say, BROOM 1 and 2, or SHOVEL 1 and 2?

I think perhaps labelling these monster cranes with signs that say simply "1" and "2" would suffice; the word "crane" on the sign being somewhat superfluous, methinks.

Yes, these are the kinds of things I think about when I'm half awake in the morning and the coffee hasn't kicked in yet.