The iconic ‘No left turn except access to KFC’ road sign has vanished. Joel MacManus investigates.

Queenstown is home to many of the world’s great natural wonders: Lake Wakatipu, The Remarkables and the only known skeleton of the New Zealand Mountain Dolphin. But all the beauty of mother nature pales in comparison to Central Otago’s top man-made wonder: the KFC road sign.

At first glance, it looks like any other New Zealand road sign. A white circle, with an arrow pointing to the left and a big red cross through it. It is a universal signal that you cannot turn left from Ballarat Street to Athol Street; nothing strange about that. But underneath the circular sign is a second sign, this one rectangular, with an important addendum: “Except access to KFC”.

As Queenstown’s most culturally significant tourist attraction, the KFC road sign has pride of place in the town centre. It sits on the edge of the village green above a gently bubbling brook. The sign draws tens of tourists from all over the world every year, including me. I have derailed many group holidays with my stubborn insistence on visiting the Queenstown KFC road sign to pay homage. The sign is quirky and quaint. It could only happen in a small town and a small country.  It’s a symbol of New Zealand’s national identity. It’s the kind of cherished icon Hayden Donnell could fit in his van and take to Te Papa.

Recently, I heard a rumour that the sign had been removed. I asked a trusted associate in Queenstown to investigate. They confirmed the terrible truth. The sign was nowhere to be found. Ballarat Street was filled with road cones, chain link fences, diggers and sandbags as part of the $150m Queenstown Town Centre Arterial Road project. The road sign has been replaced by a KFC-branded banner informing motorists to take the long way around Shotover Street. There is no left turn allowed under any circumstances, not even access to KFC.

I was devastated. This sign is special. When I first saw it, I wanted to believe it was proof of government-level favouritism towards KFC, that the Queenstown Lakes District Council and Waka Kotahi NZTA had collaboratively decreed that mass-produced fried chicken was so important that it warranted a departure from the standard road rules. 

New Zealand has always had a peculiarly intense love for KFC, much more so than its homeland of the United States. Last year, police used KFC to end a 24-hour standoff with a group of young offenders on a roof in Christchurch. During Covid-19, two gang associates were caught smuggling a car full of KFC through the Auckland border. When the level four lockdown lifted and drive-through restaurants were allowed to open, my local KFC on Kent Terrace was so overwhelmed with customers that they had to hire traffic wardens to direct cars in a big loop around the car park so they wouldn’t block the road. It seemed appropriate that KFC should be above the law.

Unfortunately, the reality is less fun. The road sign makes perfect sense. Athol Street is one way towards Ballarat Street. The only part of Athol Street that is double-laned is the first 20 metres, which turns directly into the KFC drive-through. “The sign gets plenty of interest from the public and a few appearances on Instagram, but it is really there to inform road users, improving safety and traffic flows in the process,” said Queenstown Lakes District Council spokesperson Sam White.  “It’s helpful to have ‘KFC’ on the sign (but notably no branding) because that’s the only place you can go once you drive in there – it’s a one-way road with no turn-around and no exit except the drive-through.”

The district council owns the road sign, but regulations are set by Waka Kotahi. I asked Waka Kotahi media manager Frances Adank whether there were specific rules about naming fast food chains on road signs. The top part of the sign (“no left turn”) is standard issue. The “except access to KFC” part is considered a “supplementary sign”.

All supplementary signs must comply with the first schedule of the Land Transport Traffic Control Devices Rule, which Adank paraphrased as “supplementary sign excepting the class or description of vehicle specified by the road controlling authority from the ban on the relevant movement”. The KFC road sign is not the usual use of an ‘Except class’ sign. “Vehicles are normally exempt or restricted by class, not by their drivers’ preference of fast food,” Adank said. Still, it appears the sign is legal. “It seems it is highly likely to be kosher (sticking to the food theme).”

The origins of the sign are still something of a mystery. My emails to Restaurant Brands went unanswered, but the council offered this insight: “A bit like the Colonel’s secret blend of 11 herbs and spices, the origins of the road sign are rather lost in the mists of time. While it would take QLDC staff some time and a few Jumbo Buckets to trawl through our records, with the help of Google Streetview, we can say the current sign appeared sometime between 2012 and 2015.”

My greatest concern was for the sign’s safety. Where has it gone? Will it be back? Is someone taking good care of it? White assured me the sign would make its glorious return soon. “The sign is currently safely cooped up at our construction yard while road and three waters works take place at this location. It’ll zing its way back once the project is completed.”