交警
jiāo jǐng · HSK 3
traffic police
🚦👮 交 (exchange/traffic) + 警 (police/alert) = traffic police
交 carries the traffic sense (as in 交通), and 警 is the police/alert character (as in 警察). Together they compress 交通警察 into the two-character abbreviation 交警.
交 — top 亠 + 父-like crossed legs
Originally a pictograph of a person standing with legs crossed, showing the idea of crossing or intersecting. From this concrete image, the meaning extended to abstract senses like 'exchange,' 'interact,' and 'hand over.' Modern uses such as 交流 (exchange) and 交通 (traffic) all trace back to this core notion of crossing.