Pyongyang’s famous traffic ladies have mostly disappeared from intersections throughout the city, multiple informed sources have indicated to NK News.

The female traffic officers appear to have been replaced at the vast majority of Pyongyang intersections by male traffic officials or, in some places, new sets of traffic lights, NK News understands.

“At several prominent crossroads through Pyongyang last week it was notable that the usual traffic ladies were not present and that male officers were there instead, not stood in the road but at the corners of the street,” Simon Cockerell, the General Manager of Koryo Tours, said. “Nobody seemed to know if this was a permanent or temporary policy though.”

However, at least two informed sources indicated that the replacement of the traffic ladies would likely be permanent, and had been ordered due to senior leadership concerns about their wellbeing during the heat of summer and frigid cold of winter.

It’s possible the edict to replace the traffic ladies with men could date back as far back as spring, with the late AP journalist Eric Talmadge tweeting at the time that he had noticed they were conspicuously absent during his trip.

He noted that at least one was still standing near Pyongyang airport, however, an observation that was echoed by sources speaking to NK News this week.

In 2009, Pyongyang authorities begun introducing traffic lights at major intersections throughout the city, which led some sources to indicate that the women officers could soon be gone for good.

However, as time went on it emerged that many of the female traffic controllers continued working regardless, in some cases actually manually operating nearby electronic traffic light systems.

Pyongyang “Traffic Girls” have long been something of a cult attraction for frequent visitors to North Korea, thanks to their bright uniforms and the state’s unusual reliance on human–rather than electronic–signals to control traffic.

While one such officer rose to fame in 2013 for mysteriously protecting the “leader” in a “death defying… unexpected situation,” Pyongyang’s traffic wardens have largely been ignored by North Korean state media ever since.

However, Japan’s Chosun Sinbo, a pro-North Korea newspaper which largely reflects the Pyongyang propaganda line, in 2015 capitalized on its local access to conduct an interview with one of the cities’ traffic wardens, Ryu Jong Hye.

Despite being filmed in Pyongyang and including the type of respects to leader Kim Jong Un so typical of official conversations with North Korean citizens, the interview mentioned – surprisingly – that even in North Korea, some drivers consistently ignore what the traffic wardens order.

Edited by Oliver Hotham

Featured image: NK News