Sticks and Stones

With the growth of residential area in our towns and cities comes the interesting subject of giving all of the new roads and streets their own identifying name. 

The Statutory Provisions regarding street naming are actually enshrined in the UK in the 1925 Public Health Act- sections 17 to 19. Street names are also covered by British Standards BS7666-1:2006 and BS7666-2:2006 with the intention to use these tools to provide a consistent system across the country so that each area can be identified by address and within a grid reference point. 

Local Authorities subscribe to the Public Services Mapping Agreement (PSMA) through which they receive all mapping data. 

The Data Co-operation Agreement (DCA) requires each Council to provide street and property data to a national hub in accordance with published and nationally recognised Data Entry Conventions Documents. 

Accurate meaningful and timely street naming is of course of critical importance to the emergency services and other Agencies in the delivery of their commitments and services. 

Street names and numbers comply with the following constraints. 

A street will not normally be named after a living person apart from in exceptional circumstances. Use of the names of the deceased must have full acceptance and consent from the respective family or their estate administrators. 

Streets are not normally named after a locality, town or settlement. 

There must be no duplication of a name which is in use within the same local authority boundary, in the same post town or if already in use in a neighbouring council area. 

Any names that could be construed as advertising or marketing are not acceptable. 

The use of numbers within a street name which could be confusing or misconstrued should be avoided. An example would be 20 Seven Foot Lane which sounds like 27 Foot Lane. 

The street name cannot be longer than 100 characters. 

Abbreviations should not be used although a rare exception is "St" for Saint. 

Only streets which are pedestrianised should be suffixed by walk, path, way or mall. 

The use of 'apostrophe s is to be avoided as it could be seen as in some way possessive or plural. 

Where a house builder is thinking about names for their newly built residential estate they can submit their ideas to the local Council. This gives the respective local authority three options. The first is to make a choice of those names suggested by the developer. The second is to object to any or all of the names and finally not to select a name at all. 

Of course there is the intention for all Parties to co-operate and very rarely is crisis point reached in the process.