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I saw this sample sentence while looking up 乗せる on a dictionary:

バスが乗客を乗せたり降ろしたりしているときは注意して通らなくてはならない。
While a bus is loading and unloading, you must be very careful passing it.

What I do not understand is why the negation is placed on 通る instead of 注意する. My reasoning is that 注意して通らなくてはならない should literally translate to "paying attention and (then) not passing is not desirable."

Why is the clause not written thus:

注意しないで通ってはならない

ご教授お願いいたします。どうもありがとうございます。

Yeti Ape
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    I think this is just a problem of parsing. If you parse 注意して通る as one verb, then you can interpret it as "[be careful and cross the road] must be done". – Sweeper May 16 '18 at 07:20
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    Related (almost a dupe): https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/30515/5010 – naruto May 16 '18 at 07:23
  • I thought punctuation played no role in parsing Japanese sentences. I take it that the meaning is basically context-dependent, and "注意しないで通って" is possible but not desirable (or downright wrong)? What about "having paid attention, and then not passing at all"? Does it mean I simply have to utilize punctuation properly If I wish to forcibly form this awkward sentence? (Nah it is indeed a duplicate, but sometimes it is extremely hard to find the right keywords to locate related topics. Thanks!) – Yeti Ape May 16 '18 at 07:45

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