Turkey is an interesting country as much of the country resembles the Middle-East. These areas are dry with little to no vegetation. The northern, western (and some coastal) areas of Turkey more closely resemble south-eastern Europe: they are lush, green and contain a moderate dispersion of flora. Turkey is an undulating country with even its town and cities regularly built on non-flat terrain. Turkish roads are often wide andmay be among the widest roads in the world. Directional signs often list the names of the largest cities. These signs also commonly list road numbers. If you think you are in Turkey and see the letter ‘ş’ or ç appearing on signs, then you are in Turkey. These two letters are commonly on signs and fairly distinctive as they have ‘hooks’ underneath them. Turkey typically has wide roads with undulating land throughout most of the country, including urban areas. Turkey has a diverse landscape. The northern and western parts of the country are green with moderate amounts of flora. The eastern part of Turkey is green, with little to no flora. Large parts of the remainder of Turkey are dry with a real lack of flora. Many Turkish residents live in apartments that are a number of stories high with a terracotta, tiled roof. Some of the higher Turkish apartments have flatter roofs. Turkey has standard European license plates with the blue stripe on the left. Turkey has bold, black lettering on its plates. As a result, you will often see black markings on the plate. These bollards are a common sight throughout Turkey and resemble the Australian bollards with a slightly fatter rectangle. Turkey has these fairly unique red and white road arrows indicating corners. Turkey uses a wide range of utility poles. Some of the more recognisable poles have large holes in them. These poles are different to the poles in Romania, Hungary and Poland as they are made out of metal and have larger holes. There are variants of the above poles in Turkey, featuring zigzagging metal bars throughout the centre. Turkey uses the standard European warning signs. Turkey uses either blue or green coloured directional signs. Turkish kilometre markers are pictured above. There are two important components to these markers. Firstly, the number (and sometimes letter) in the top left corner indicates what road you are on. If you see the letter ‘o’ followed by a number you are on that road. If you see just a number in the top left corner, you are on a D road. Ignore the number in the top right corner. The number on the bottom row is the kilometre number of the sign on that road. Ankara is the only city in Turkey to have these unique-looking street signs that feature a curved top-middle section of the sign. These signs are found right across Ankara.

Most Helpful:

The language of Turkey and the phone numbers can help you recognize Turkey easily. The bollards are also useful if you are not in an urban area.

Bollard:

Turkish bollards are white with a red rectangle. They do not have anything on the back. It ends up looking like a white painted stick.

Unique Vehicle:

All taxis in Turkey will be yellow. The pattern, or lack of a pattern, seems to be based on the company the taxi is employed by. You can often find phone numbers on the sides of these taxis, but they seem to lack an area code.

Road Lines:

Turkey uses all white lines. In high danger areas, like areas that expect plenty of snow, you can see yellow shoulders to help with visibility.

Road Signs:

Turkey uses blue and white backed road signs.

Turkish road information signs have white borders.

The backs of Turkish signs have folded edges.

Turkish stop signs say dur.

Turkey uses a standard guard rail with a red reflector as well as the flat faced guardrail.

While not necessarily a road sign, Turkish trash bins are metal and squared. They often have writing on the front, allowing you to see the language.

Electricity poles:

Turkey uses metal, wooden, and concrete poles.

License plates:

Turkey uses white plates with a blue strip on the left side. They look like your typical EU plate. The first two numbers indicate which region the car is from. However, there are 81 different codes. Most of the numbers were assigned in Alphabetical order. This changed after 67. Each number from 68 to 81 was assigned as the region became a province.
There are three exceptions to this, with Mersin, Kahramanmaraş and Şanlıurfa being out of order. Their names were changed from İçel, Maraş and Urfa, respectively.

Vegetation/Landscape:

Turkey has a rather dry landscape featuring a fair few mountainous regions.

Architecture:

Turkey has many apartment blocks.

While Turkey is not the only country to feature these tall spires, they are very common in Turkey.

Turkey has plenty of houses that are colorful. Their roofs seem to be a darkened style of the red roofs you see in the Mediterranean area. The buildings themselves are just plaster with a color that makes them stand out.

General look:

Turkey likes to build their settlements on top of hills for some reason. If you see some buildings on top of a hill, there’s a good chance you are in Turkey.

