9/365: Redundant Street

There must be a story behind this redundant street name.

The main road of a small housing development called Lumpkins Forest (no apostrophe), its sign reads, “FORESTRD DR.” Maps label it, “Forestroad Drive.”

I didn’t really pay attention to the name until we moved into our current house and now drive past the street to and from the city almost every day. When I noticed it, I thought it must be a typo. Or something. It aggravated me.

A little while later, my mom, who worked as a rural mail carrier until her retirement just over a year ago, told me that her coworkers at the post office used to joke about the street name.

Signs plus maps plus mail equals not a typo. Weird.

The neighborhood isn’t run-down and boarded-up like the house on the other side of the highway that’s shown here. It’s full of really nice houses that are well taken care of, from what I can see.

I wonder if I could live on a redundant street. I wonder if I would roll my eyes or sigh every time I had to type or write my address if I did. I wonder if I could resist the urge to complain and organize a protest.

I know for sure I’d at least get to the bottom of the backstory.

2 thoughts on “9/365: Redundant Street

  1. Tyson

    Interesting! I wonder if its backstory included being just called “Forest Road”, like an RR, until it was renovated as a neighbourhood into a “Drive” and the city didn’t want to/couldn’t take up the valuable sign space with the three words fully spelt.

    Reply
    1. Jo Hawke Post author

      Good guess, Tyson, but when that street was made, the county only used street numbers. I know this because my dad posted on Facebook that he was delivering mail out there when the street was cut, and it wasn’t until maybe the mid-’90s or after when they decided to add the street names. They called them “9-1-1 addresses” because they were changed to help the emergency-services people find houses more efficiently. Everyone was expected to put up a sign with their “9-1-1 address.”

      Maybe, like Kevin just said, it was being called “Forest Road” by the people who used it, but since it’s a short road, it didn’t meet the qualifications for a “road.”

      Reply

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