how is house number assigned

How Do Houses Get Numbered?

By kara kovalchik | nov 22, 2013.

You’d think that if you lived on a small cul-de-sac with only four houses, it would be simple: The house numbers would simply be one, two, three and four. But Government is not about “simple.”

Every municipality has its own system, but most follow one of two systems: continuous numbering, or hundred-block. Both systems are blocked out on grids, and both have a “baseline,” or zero point. That is the point where addresses will start, and you’ll find either 1 Main Street or 100 Main Street, depending on the system. Continuous numbering involves a formula wherein the local government first determines how many addresses are to be contained in one mile. Say the number is 1000; divide that by 5280 (the number of feet in one mile), and it equals approximately one address number every five feet.

In a hundred-block system, addresses are plotted out on a grid, where it dictates that the house at point XY is number 100, and the numbers increase sequentially within the same block. The grid is usually carefully broken down into X number of houses comprising a block, and are mapped out as the “200 block” or “400 block” of Elm Street.

Of course, add into the above formulae the further mandates of odd/even numbering based on east/west or north/south streets, and it’s enough to convince you to not choose a career in civil engineering.

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Nutty Numbering: How Are House Addresses Determined?

The methodology behind street address numbering.

How are house address numbers chosen? Photo: ms.ark via cc/Flickr

At some point, we’ve all pointed out how scattered and unsystematic house numbers are. Addresses don’t increase at steady increments; three houses in the same neighborhood can share the same number; numbers suddenly switch from decreasing to increasing midway down a road. Why aren’t houses on a street just numbered 1, 2, 3, 4?

It’s a complicated, confusing system that varies from area to area, but here are the basics of how house addresses are determined.

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Explanation of street address and house numbers

When municipalities determine how to number addresses, they start by measuring the distance the property sits from an established zero point, or baseline (such as the city center). This central point gives the city or county a consistent location from which to measure and number all existing and future addresses . The individual numbers are then determined following methods such as:

• House numbers increase by a certain amount based on their distance from the baseline (such as increasing by 1,000 for every mile or 5,280 for every mile).
• Blocks are divided into zones and given a digit for the hundreds place (such as the 500 zone).
• The final two digits are determined by how many individual properties (homes or businesses) can be established within that grid.
• Even and odd numbers are on opposite sides of the street.

The rules used by the civil planning engineers varies depending on population, street configurations, and other factors. For instance, rural areas use different measurements for numbering than metropolitan areas, and some of the numbers might even correspond to the route they’re located on.

Of course, this is a simplified explanation of some considerations behind assigning house numbers. The actual system will make your head spin.

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Sources:   Mental Floss , Planning.org

The News Wheel is a digital auto magazine providing readers with a fresh perspective on the latest car news. We’re located in the heart of America (Dayton, Ohio) and our goal is to deliver an entertaining and informative perspective on what’s trending in the automotive world. See more articles from The News Wheel.

How do they decide house numbers?

By: Author Olin Wade (Remodel or Move Stuff)

House numbers are typically assigned by local municipal authorities. The numbering system used can vary from region to region and even from city to city depending on local practices. Generally, house numbers start at one and increase sequentially as you move along a street.

The odd numbers will be on one side and the even numbers on the other. In some places, house numbers may be assigned based on a road or street’s geographical location. For example, in some areas the first house on the right-hand side may be labelled number one, while the last house will be labelled the highest number on that side of the street.

Houses may also be assigned numbers based on characteristics such as the size or shape of a lot. In some cases, house numbers may also be assigned alphabetically.

Do house numbers have to be a certain size?

Yes, house numbers do have to meet certain size requirements in order to be clearly visible and legible. Most local municipalities will have specific regulations indicating the size of house numbers.

Generally, they should be at least four inches tall and either a dark colour or a material that reflects light (such as reflective vinyl). It is also important to make sure that the numbers are securely affixed in a position that is easily visible from the street or sidewalk, such as on the front door, gate, or fence.

In some localities, house numbers can also be illuminated for better visibility.

What size house numbers should I get?

When it comes to selecting a size of house numbers, it is important to consider the visibility of the numbers, the size and scale of your house, as well as your personal preference. Generally, house numbers should be between 4” and 6” tall, depending on the size and scale of your house.

If your house is tall, narrow, or two stories, then a larger size house number may be necessary to ensure proper visibility. Additionally, if your house is situated far back from the street view, then a bigger size house number may be appropriate.

Ultimately, it is important to choose a size that will suit the overall style of your home, as well as ensure that your house numbers are visible from the street.

What is the lucky number for house?

The lucky number for a house is often considered to be the address number associated with the building or residence. According to the ancient Chinese art of Feng Shui, an address number that consists of a single digit or an auspicious combination of single digits is considered to be the luckiest and most auspicious number.

Alternatively, some associated lucky numbers with certain colors. Feng Shui and other Chinese superstitions say that the colors green and red represent wealth, while the colors black and white represent death.

Therefore, depending on the colors used in the home, specific colors may be chosen in order to gain luck, prosperity and protection from negative influences. It should be noted, however, that the luckiest number for your house is likely to depend on many factors, including other superstitions and beliefs in addition to Feng Shui.

Which number is not good for house?

As different cultures have different ideas of what is considered lucky or unlucky. Some cultures consider the number 4 bad luck due to its similarity to the Chinese word for death. Other cultures think odd numbers are bad luck, as well as the number 13, which is considered to bring bad luck in many Western cultures.

In addition to this, numbers that are associated with certain religions or pagan beliefs may be seen as not good for a house. Ultimately, it is up to the individual to decide which number is best to use.

What is an unlucky house number?

An unlucky house number is any number that is thought to bring bad luck or create a sense of unease. According to superstition, certain numbers, like the number 4 in some Asian and European countries, are considered bad luck because it sounds like the words ‘death’ or ‘die’ in various cultures.

Additionally, numbers like 13 have been associated with bad luck in some western cultures because of the biblical tradition that Jesus was betrayed by his 13th apostle. Other unlucky numbers can vary by culture and region, but some common unlucky house numbers include 4, 7, and 13.

Is house 4 lucky number?

It depends on your personal beliefs and cultural background. Many cultures have regarded 4 as an unlucky number because it is an even number, while odd numbers are traditionally seen as lucky. For example, in Chinese, Japanese and Korean cultures, 4 is usually considered unlucky, because the pronunciation of the number 4 (“si”) is the same as the Chinese word for “death”.

Other cultures may look at number 4 differently. In Hinduism, the number 4 (four pillars of humanity) signifies justice and truth. In Norse mythology, 4 is one of the three goddesses of fate and is considered a lucky number.

The list goes on. Ultimately, it’s up to you to decide if number 4 is lucky or unlucky.

How do you make a floating number?

A floating number is a number with a decimal point separating the integer and fractional parts. To make a floating number, start by finding the decimal fraction for the fractional part of the number you want to make.

Then, multiply the fraction by the power of ten that would move the decimal point to the end of the fractional part. Finally, add the integer part to the answer you receive from multiplying the fraction.

As an example, if you wanted to make the number 3.14, you would start by finding the decimal fraction for 0.14 (= 0.14). Then, you would multiply 0.14 by 100 (because moving the decimal two places to the right is the same as multiplying by 100) to get 14.

Finally, adding 3 to 14 gives you the answer 3.14 which is the floating number you wanted to make.

How do you set up a raised address number?

Setting up a raised address number requires a few steps. First, you’ll need to measure the area you’d like the address numbers to be mounted, either on the side of a house, mailbox, or post. Next, you’ll need to purchase the raised address numbers.

They are typically sold as a set of 4-6 numbers, a mounting bracket and all necessary hardware. Mark the area that you measured and drill in the mounting bracket using the appropriate screws. Place the address numbers on the mounting bracket being sure to secure them tightly.

If desired, you can paint the numbers to match the color of the house or post. Now you have a professionally installed raised address number, allowing your home or address to be quickly identified.

Do It Yourself address plaque?

Yes, it is possible to make your own address plaque! Making your own address plaque is a great way to create something unique that reflects your own personal style and aesthetic. You can make an address plaque out of a variety of materials, such as wood, metal, ceramic, or plastic.

You will need some tools to get started, such as a saw, drill, sander, and paint.

Depending on the type of material you choose and the size of the plaque you are creating, you may need additional supplies. If you are using wood, you may need some wood glue and screws, while metal will require special tools like welding equipment.

Before you begin, gather all the supplies that you need and read the instructions that come with them.

Once you have all the materials and equipment necessary, you can get to work. Begin by cutting the material to the desired size and shape for the address plaque. Drill holes for any screws and apply the glue if necessary.

Sand down the material to ensure a smooth surface, and then paint the plaque with the desired color. Apply lettering, numbers, or designs to the plaque.

When you are finished, you will have a beautiful address plaque that you created yourself! Not only will it look great and reflect your own style and sense of creativity, but you will also have the satisfaction of a project well-done.

How do you paint an address with plaque?

Painting an address with a plaque requires several steps:

1. Start by cleaning the plaque with soapy water and a soft cloth. Rinse with clean water and dry with a paper towel.

2. Sand the plaque with fine sandpaper if it is necessary for a smoother finish. Use a clean cloth to remove any excess dust.

3. Use painter’s tape to create a crisp, straight line to divide the plaque into the top half and the bottom half. Use a pencil to draw your address format on the bottom half of the plaque.

4. Use a paintbrush to paint the base color around the design of your address. Allow the paint to dry completely.

5. Use a brush or a stencil to paint the lettering of the address. If needed, lightly sand over any areas that need improvement.

6. Once the lettering has dried, use a brush to paint a complementary color over the address. Seal with a clear coat spray after the base and lettering colors have completely dried.

7. Hang the plaque with 2-3 screws and enjoy your new painted address plaque!

How can I make my house numbers more visible at night?

To make your house numbers more visible at night, you can utilize a number of different options. First, you can install a solar-powered house number sign on the front of your home. This is a relatively inexpensive option, and it will light up your house number at night when the sun goes down.

Another option is to install LED lighting around your house number to make it more visible, both day and night. You can also use illuminated signs to outline the numbers of your house, adding a decorative flair to your home.

Finally, you can use reflective house numbers, which will reflect the light of passing cars or streetlamps to make your house number visible during nighttime hours.

How are house numbers attached to siding?

House numbers are typically attached to siding by either using an adhesive or screws depending on the material of the siding. If you’re using an adhesive, look for a product specifically for exterior use and make sure it’s compatible with the material of your siding.

To affix the house numbers to the siding with screws, pre-drill holes into the house number so that screws can be inserted, making sure the screws are long enough to penetrate the siding and hold the number in place.

For brick or concrete siding, use masonry anchors instead of screws. Make sure to follow the manufacturer’s instructions for installation. It is also important to choose a location that is visible and easily accessible so that drivers can read your house number.

How are homes numbered?

Homes are numbered in various ways depending on the city or region. Generally, homes are numbered sequentially, either in an ascending format (1, 2, 3 etc) or a descending format (3, 2, 1). Some cities may use a combination of both, such as numbers beginning in the low hundreds and then descending back to the single digits.

Additionally, some cities or neighborhoods may use a grid-like format, where blocks or streets are numbered evenly in one direction and cross streets reverse the numbering (10, 9, 8 etc). Rural areas may use a postal numbering system, typically using a fractional format (1/2, 1/4, 1/8 etc).

This is used to help locate homes as rural roads may not be given traditional street names. Additionally, certain buildings, apartments, or condos may be numbered individually and given specific unit numbers (Unit 19, Apartment 4B, Building 8 etc).

Where should your house number be?

Your house number should ideally be placed either directly on the front of your house or on the mailbox or post if you have one. The house number should be clearly visible from the street, so it’s best to place it at least 3-4 feet off the ground.

Make sure there is enough contrast between the number and the color of the wall so that it is easily visible from the street. It is also important that your house number is large enough to be seen from a distance but not too big so that it looks out of place.

If you have more than one address associated with your house (e. g. for a multi-family dwelling), make sure to include both the primary and secondary numbers.

Can a house number be changed?

Yes, it is possible to change a house number. This usually requires approval from the local Planning Department or other city/county authority, depending on the specific regulations in your area. You may need to fill out an application form, state the reason for the change, and provide the required documents for proof of ownership and occupancy.

Your application may also need to be approved by a zoning board or other governmental body, with a possible public hearing. There can also be additional requirements depending on the jurisdiction. Once approved, you also need to arrange to have the old and new numbers posted/painted on the building.

Depending on the situation, you may need a contractor to do the work, or you may be able to do it yourself if legal in your jurisdiction. In certain cases, it is possible to change the house number without going through the approval process if the new number is part of an approved street name change, a change of street name, or an assigned address away from a pre-existing street name or route.

However, it is always best to check with your local Planning Department or other authority before proceeding with a number change.

How high should house numbers be placed?

House numbers should be placed at a height of at least four inches, with the bottom of the number at least four inches from the ground. The house number should be visible from the street, so it should be high enough for drivers and pedestrians to easily see.

Some homeowners may opt for a higher placement for greater visibility. Keep in mind that taller numbers might require the use of a ladder. Additionally, to help house numbers stand out and be more visible, choosing a color that contrasts with the house (such as white on a dark-colored siding) can help.

It could also be helpful to add lighting to help house numbers be seen in the dark.

What are good house numbers in feng shui?

Good house numbers in feng shui are considered particularly lucky due to their energetic qualities that are believed to bring good luck, fortune, and prosperity. Feng shui house numbers range from one to nine and are associated with the Chinese ancient I-Ching numerology.

For example, the number one is associated with ambition and new opportunities, two stands for harmony and balance, and four signifies good health. The numbers six, eight and nine are thought to be the luckiest house numbers in feng shui since they have the strongest energy.

Six brings wealth, eight is for prosperity and good fortune, and nine brings completion and a successful conclusion to any project. While most homeowners strive for the luckiest numbers, any number can be made energetically beneficial by the use of colors and natural elements.

Additionally, many people select the number that corresponds with their address, such as the last digit of their apartment number or street number. However, the most important factor when selecting a house number in feng shui is that it resonates with you, as every number has a unique and personal interpretation.

Is 7 a good house number?

Overall, whether 7 is a good house number depends on personal preference and beliefs. In certain cultures, 7 is considered a lucky number, while in others it is thought to bring potential bad luck. In Chinese culture, 7 is seen as a lucky number as it sounds like the Chinese word qi, which means good fortune.

In other cultures, such as Japan, Korea and India, the number is viewed more negatively as it is associated with spirituality.

On a more practical level, 7 is a good house number in the sense that it is easy to remember, and it is a short number that does not take too long to say. Additionally, 7 is a fairly common number, so if you do ever get lost, you are more likely to find your house number if it is 7.

At the end of the day, it is up to you to decide if you believe 7 is a good house number. Your opinion should take into account both the cultural and practical aspects of the number in order to make a decision.

Do you have to display your house number?

Yes, you are generally required to display your house number. Generally, local laws and ordinances require homeowners to display their house numbers so they can be easily located in cases of emergency.

House numbers help the fire department, ambulance personnel, or police officers locate the residence in a timely fashion. House numbers are also necessary for delivery companies and service technicians who need to locate a home or business quickly.

Without the house numbers, these individuals may have a difficult time locating the address they need. Additionally, many cities and neighborhoods have regulations in place that require homeowners to display house numbers.

The size, color, and height of the numbers must also meet certain standards, which vary depending on the municipality or HOA.

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Decoding the Address: How to Find and Understand Your House Number

Your house number is more than just a combination of digits. It's an essential part of your address, serving as a unique identifier for your residence. However, have you ever wondered about the significance behind those seemingly random numbers? Understanding how to know your house number and its significance can offer insights into the history, geography, and layout of your neighbourhood.

Let's delve into the world of house numbers and discover the stories they hold.

1. the basics: how to know your house number.

To start, let's demystify the process of finding your house number. Locating your house number is straightforward, usually involving a glance at your mailbox, front door, or entryway. It's the combination of numbers assigned to your residence by local authorities to facilitate efficient mail delivery, emergency response, and navigation.

2. Sequential Numbering and Street Layouts

In urban areas, particularly newer neighbourhoods, house numbers often follow a sequential pattern. This means that neighbouring houses are numbered consecutively as they are built along a street. This approach simplifies navigation and helps people find addresses more easily.

3. Odd and Even Numbers

Many neighbourhoods employ a system of odd and even numbers to distinguish between sides of the street. Odd numbers are typically assigned to one side of the road, while even numbers are assigned to the other side. This system aids in locating addresses with minimal confusion.

4. Significance of Leading Digits

In some regions, the leading digits of your house number may provide additional insights. For instance, specific communities use the first digit to represent the block or section of the neighbourhood where the house is located. This can help residents and visitors quickly understand the approximate location of a property.

5. Hidden Histories and Cultural Nuances

House numbers often harbour fascinating historical and cultural significance. Some older neighbourhoods have retained their original numbering systems, which can offer a glimpse into the area's history. Additionally, cultural beliefs and superstitions can influence house number assignments. In certain cultures, specific numbers are considered lucky or unlucky, affecting residents' preferences and choices.

6. Numerology and Personal Beliefs

Numerology, the study of the mystical significance of numbers, plays a role in how some people perceive their house numbers. Some individuals believe that their house number influences their life experiences and fortunes. For example, a numerologist might analyse the sum of the digits in your house number to provide insights into your home's energy and impact on your life.

7. Identifying Community Trends

Examining how house numbers are assigned within a community can reveal interesting trends. For instance, some neighbourhoods might have themes for their house numbers, such as incorporating historical or nature-related elements. This not only adds character to the area but also strengthens the sense of community among residents.

8. House Number Evolution

As neighbourhoods grow and develop, house numbers may evolve to accommodate new constructions or reconfigurations. These changes are often managed by local authorities to maintain the orderliness of the address system. Understanding these shifts can provide insights into the growth and transformation of your neighbourhood over time.

9. Digital Mapping and Navigation

In the digital age, house numbers play a crucial role in navigation systems and online maps. When you enter an address into a navigation app, your house number guides the route. This underscores the importance of accurate and well-maintained house numbering systems.

10. Pride of Place

Beyond its practical purposes, your house number contributes to your sense of place and identity. It's not just an address; it's a part of your home, reflecting your unique spot in the world. Knowing your house number connects you to your community and highlights your place in the local landscape.

In conclusion, understanding how to know your house number goes beyond mere navigation; it's an exploration of the rich tapestry of history, culture, and geography that makes up your neighbourhood. Whether you live in a bustling city or a serene suburb, your house number carries significance that extends beyond its numeric value. Take a moment to appreciate the stories your house number tells and the role it plays in your everyday life. It's a reminder that even in the modern world, magic in the simplest details shapes our surroundings.

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Are house numbers required by law on the front of a house?

Friday, September 21, 2018

The requirement to have house address numbers is almost universally required by municipal ordinances. Each city or county has a slightly different standard, but their intentions are the same: that your house numbers be clearly visible from the street so that the police, paramedics or a fire engine responding to your 911 emergency call can locate the right house.

    The numbers do not have to be on the house itself. They can be on a mailbox, fence, or post in front of the home. The minimum height of the numbers in City of Gainesville is three inches, and in Alachua County it’s four inches. There are also typically specifications on the minimum width of the stroke of each number and that there be sufficient contrast between the numbers and the background for them to be easily readable.

   All of this may seem like another example of government’s intrusion on the right of a private citizen to use their own property without interference...until your spouse has a heart attack in the middle of the night and an emergency paramedic van goes screaming by the house, then has to turn around and double back, using a searchlight to try to find your house number.

   Also, a common problem that emergency responders have in locating a house is that the numbers are there but have been obscured by foliage growth over time, like in the photo at the top of the page.

   Here’s an excerpt from the City of Gainesville’s ordinance:

Sec. 23-30. Posting of numbers.

New and existing buildings shall have approved address numbers placed in a position to be plainly legible and visible from the street or road fronting the property, whether or not mail is delivered to such building or property. These numbers shall contrast with their background. Address numbers shall be Arabic numerals or alphabet letters. It shall be the duty of the owners of each building in the incorporated area to post the assigned building number on the property in the following manner:

(1) The building (address) number shall be affixed to the front of the building, or to a separate structure in front of the building (such as mailbox, post, wall, fence, etc.), in such a manner so as to be clearly visible and legible from the public or private way on which the building fronts.

(2) Numerals shall be Arabic and shall not be less than three inches in height and one-half inch in stroke width for residential buildings, structures, or portions thereof, and at least six inches in height for all other buildings, structures, or portions thereof. Where address identification is required by the fire official on other elevations of buildings, structures, or portions thereof, such numerals shall be not less than three inches in height for residential and at least six inches in height for all other buildings, structures, or portions thereof. Existing numbers may be exempt if approved by the city fire inspector.

The numerals shall be of a contrasting color with the immediate background of the building or structure on which such numerals are affixed.

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Street Naming and House Numbering Systems

Pas report 13, historic pas report series.

Welcome to the American Planning Association's historical archive of PAS Reports from the 1950s and 1960s, offering glimpses into planning issues of yesteryear.

Use the search above to find current APA content on planning topics and trends of today.

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"Though fog or night the scene encumbers, Why don't all buildings show their numbers On lintel, wall or door? Why can't a house say good and plenty, 'Hey look at me! I'm Nineteen-twenty, The joint you're looking for!'

"Why can't our thoroughfares, our highways, Our squares, our streets, our parks, our byways, Have signs where all can see? 'I'm Lincoln Place.' 'I'm Pershing Corner.' 'I'm Avenue Ignatius-Horner.' 'I'm Boulevard Legree.'

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"So, dwellings, mansions, roadways, alleys, As well as rivers, mountains, valleys And hamlets near and far Throughout this self-effacing nation, We really want the information; Please tell us who you are! "

— Arthur Guiterman

Problems of street naming and house numbering may confront planning commissions in relation to new subdivisions or new planned neighborhood developments or these problems may arise simply as a result from the difficulties that have come out of the accumulated inefficiencies of an outmoded system. PLANNING ADVISORY SERVICE has recently received a number of inquiries on this subject.

No one would advocate designing a city or a subdivision along certain lines merely because it would be easy for the visitor or the delivery truck to locate persons and buildings. A well-planned community, with well-grouped major uses and service facilities, and with efficient means of intercommunication, is the primary concern of planners. However, once a street plan has been adopted by a community, with major and minor streets laid out, with feeder streets, and residential streets, and through highways and heavy traffic bearers, designed each according to its function, facilitating the use of these streets follows naturally. In part, the general attitude towards street naming and house numbering might be compared to that towards calendar reform; everybody is in favor of the reform, but such reform does not have top priority.

Correct as this attitude may be, it is unwarranted to dismiss street naming and house numbering systems as unimportant. Since planning in part is directed to providing rationality and order in community life, and in making communities more efficient and convenient, ease in locating places and facilities within a community should be encouraged.

This need has been recognized by citizen associations as well as official agencies. For example, the City Club of Chicago was instrumental in dramatizing the importance of clarifying the city's muddled street system. The first major attempt to systematize Chicago's street names was done in 1895; in 1913 and 1936 further clarification took place. The Nashville Times and Nashville Banner conducted a newspaper campaign in 1940 to reorganize the Nashville, Tennessee, naming and numbering procedure. Citizen support led to the formation of a special Joint Standing Committee on Ordinances on the Nomenclature of Streets in Boston in 1879 to recommend changes in that historic city's street naming policies — the recommendations made by the Commission at this early date contain some of the same general recommendations made today.

General Arguments for Adopting a Street Naming and House Numbering System

Many arguments may be advanced to justify the need for special funds for a study of existing practices in a community, or to justify a street naming and house numbering reorganization ordinance:

• Unfavorable impression on visitors to the community if they have difficulty in finding places of interest and the businesses and persons they wish to see.
• Expense to delivery services in routing and rerouting packages.
• Difficulty in quick delivery of mail.
• Loss of letters and goods, wrongly addressed.
• Potential increase in traffic accidents by motorists intent on searching for correct address rather than on driving.
• Difficulty in training civic employees in knowledge of the city, and the resultant disappointment by residents and visitors in the caliber of these employees and the government in general.
• Subconscious feeling of estrangement toward community on the part of residents and visitors to the community.
• Difficulty in emergency fire, ambulance and doctor access to correct address.
• Difficulty in maintaining correct legal documents, such as those for licenses, vital statistics, deeds.

Agencies and Organizations that may be Helpful in Devising a Street Naming and House Numbering System

• The local post office.
• Local police department.
• A retailers' association or large department stores.
• Chamber of Commerce.
• Better business associations, businessmen's associations such as Kiwanis, Rotary, etc.
• Local Railway Express Company.
• Real estate board, local home builder's association, subdividers of large tracts, abstract firms.
• The local newspaper.
• Regional office of the Federal Housing Administration.
• Local civic groups.
• Local utility companies.
• Local medical society and health department.

It is assumed that the street department, the city engineer, the department of public works, will be among the most interested municipal officials.

Possible Objections to a New System

Objections may be raised to changing street names and house numbers. These generally come from those business or professional firms that feel a close identification of their activities with their street address. Objections are also raised, particularly in some of the older areas, if it is believed historic names will be discarded, and that the municipality will thus lose some of its individuality. Also, some persons object to change per se, believing that if a previous system worked at a previous time, it should not be altered. The section on court decisions in this report discusses whether individuals have rights in maintaining existing street names.

General Recommendations:

1. No duplication of names or numbers. It is preferable not to have differentiation by a suffix "street" or "avenue." For example, "Washington Street" and "Washington Avenue" can too easily be confused, since often "avenue" and "street" are synonymous in the public mind. In some communities "place" is used to indicate a minor street closely associated with a major street — for example, "St. Anne Place" might be located a half block from "St. Anne Street." The suffix differentiation "place" is more defensible than the former example, since "place" generally connotes a subsidiary street, and because it more unusual that the ordinary suffixes, "street" and "avenue."

2. Continuation of a street name. A street should have one name only and should have the same name throughout its entire length. If the street is not a through street but is broken by intervening land uses and is laid out in substantially the same location at a more distant point, the same name should be used on all of the "links."

In some communities, if a street jogs sharply, the portion of the street running in the different direction is given another name.

3. There should be base lines dividing the community into east, west, north and south sections. It is not imperative that the suffixes "east," "west," "north," and "south" be used if a continuous numbering system is used, and if there are not many through streets. However, if the numbers radiate from the base intersecting streets, and there are many through streets, it will be easier to have such suffixes.

4. Numbers on parallel streets should be comparable. If a parallel street does not originate at the same point as another street, the numbers should not begin with a low number but should begin with the same number on a parallel street measured from the base line.

5. Numbering should be uniform, based on street frontage. This should be done within blocks and between blocks.

6. Numbering should be consecutive.

7. Even numbers should always be on one side of the street, and odd on the other. Common practice is to place even numbers on the north and west sides of streets and odd numbers on the south and east sides of streets.

8. It is good practice to distinguish between size and importance of street, and direction of street, by terminology. For example, "street" might be used for east-west streets, and "avenue" for north-south streets, or vice-versa. Diagonal streets or heavy traffic bearers might be called "boulevard." State or federal routes might be called "highway." "Drive" might be used for scenic pleasure thoroughfares. Curvilinear streets might use "place," "road," "way," and "lane," etc. (The Committee on Terminology established by the American Society of Planning Officials may make recommendations for the use of these terms.)

Miscellaneous Considerations

Subdividers have found that there is greater "sales appeal" for houses on named streets, particularly if "romantic" names are used with suffices such as "place," "road," "lane," than on numbered streets. For example, the home purchaser prefers to live on "Rose Lane" than on "72nd Street."

Natural barriers such as a river or lake front, a ridge, etc., or man-created barriers such as railroad tracks, often are useful "basing points" for street naming systems and house numbering systems, if these barriers are outstanding and bear a suitable relationship to the growth of the town.

The heart of the central business district is a good "basing point" for such systems. There may be a shift in the location of the central business district at a later date, but such shift should not cause disruption of the street naming system.

Central business district retailers' associations may be very much interested in seeing that the street naming and house numbering system radiates from the central business district. For example, in Chicago, Western Avenue and Madison Street were selected as the base lines for dividing the city into quadrants.  The business interests in "The Loop" objected and were influential in establishing State Street and Madison Street as the dividing lines, even though that meant that there would be virtually no north-east quadrant of the city, due to the curve in Lake Michigan in that area.

In many communities, particularly in the Midwest, streets were laid out by law on the U. S. section lines. In some of these communities; the applicable regulations pertaining to the establishment of a gridiron street pattern have never been repealed. There also may be legal obstacles in establishing curvilinear street patterns or "super blocks" as well as perhaps some local street department reluctance to spoiling a gridiron street naming and numbering system.

Subdividers of large tracts have advised that street names be distinctive within a subdivision so that even though a visitor cannot immediately find an address on a curvilinear street, or in a cul-de-sac, he can immediately identify it as to its general location.

When a new street naming and numbering system is put into effect, it should be done completely at one time and not piecemeal over a period of time.

Presidents, states, famous women, famous army and military heroes, trees, famous men, cities, are favorite street name choices. Descriptive names such as "Lake," "Main," "Church" are also common. Historical names are often selected.

Streets may have interesting names which are in no way related to actual conditions, for example, a River Street may not be near any water, a Crooked Street may be straight, a Southport Avenue may not be close to a port. In Chicago, a Garfield Boulevard terminates at Washington Park, and a Washington Boulevard runs through a Garfield Park. It is not easy to select names, particularly for large cities. It was reported that London had approximately 5,350 street names, Paris 1,628, New York 5,003, Philadelphia 1,914, Baltimore 3,923, Cleveland 2,199, Detroit 2,262, and Chicago 1,360.

Communities requiring the posting of numbers often specify the type of lettering, size of numbers, etc. (See the Tucson, Arizona proposed ordinance in this report.) Some communities purchase these numbers, and others require the property owner to furnish them. Some communities paint or stencil the house number on the curb as well as requiring it on the house door itself.

Examples of Street Naming and House Numbering Systems

Tulsa, Oklahoma, is based on a grid with the basic line Main Street running north and south and the Frisco tracks running east and west. All the streets east of Main are named in alphabetical order for cities of the United States situated east of the Mississippi — Boston, Cincinnati, Detroit, Elgin, etc.; while all those lying west of Maine are named for western cities — also in alphabetical order, such as Boulder, Cheyenne, Denver, etc. All the streets south of the Frisco tracks are named numerically in sequence — 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc., while those north of the tracks are named after prominent Indians or pioneer citizens and arranged alphabetically — Archer, Brady, Cameron, and others. In all parts of the city, the house numbers start with the even hundred at each corner.

M. C. Shibley, City Engineer for Tulsa, reported in the American City , March, 1938, that:

"One can see at a glance what a simple problem it is to reach any desired number from any other part of the city. Suppose, for example, one wishes to go to 615 Cincinnati. Everyone knows Main Street, which is one of the principal business streets of the city. Cincinnati is an eastern city, therefore he knows that Cincinnati Street is the second block east of main. All the streets that are named numerically lie south of the Frisco tracks. Therefore, he knows that house number 615 is in the southern part of the city between 6th and 7th streets. All the house numbers on streets running north of the tracks have the prefix of the letter "N," thus making a clear distinction between 615 and N. 615. . . . "

An example of a small city that recently renumbered and renamed its streets, is that of DeQuincy, Louisiana, population approximately, 5,000. The old street system gave each addition or sub-addition to the city a code number which formed part of the house number; the block number also formed part of the house number as did the relative location of the house on the block (or actual house number). Thus, a house located in a new subdivision, might have a house number such as 98562 although it was only one block distant from a house numbered 403. Also, under the old system, some streets had different names at different portions of their length, one street having three names. Ten streets had to be renamed, so that each would have the same name throughout its entire length.

After the revision, two streets were set up as basing points, Division Street running north and south, and Center Street running east and west. Now, all of the streets have a prefix designating north, east, south or west. At the point where Center and Division Streets intersect, and house numbers increase in size, the further the distance from these intersecting points. The streets are laid out in gridiron fashion.

Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin , recently revised its street naming system: on the east side-of the bay, which is the larger area, all north-south streets were assigned numerical names, beginning with "First Avenue," and the east-west streets were given geographical names (mostly states), beginning with "Alabama Street" and proceeding geographically to "Utah Street." On the west side of the bay, the north-south streets were given the names of cities, alphabetically arranged, and the east-west streets are named after trees.

Oshkosh, Wisconsin , prepared a new address system in 1949 which specified that all north-south streets should be called "Street," all east-west streets should be called "Avenue," all diagonal streets should be called "Drives," and all unrelated dead-end streets should be called "Courts." Rhinelander is another Wisconsin city that has adopted a new street naming and numbering system.

Henderson, Tennessee , adopted a new property numbering system in 1949 in which a grid was used and where there was a bend in the street, the numbering was continued as though the street was straight. An ordinance to provide for a uniform system of numbering in Jefferson City, Tennessee was published in Community Planning in Tennessee , a 1942 report of the Tennessee State Planning Commission.

The street-naming system of the metropolitan area of a city should be linked to the central city. A good example of a coordinated street naming pattern is in the vicinity of Washington, D. C.

The northeast Maryland suburbs falling within the area of the Maryland National Capital Park and Planning Commission adopted a street naming system in 1941, which is primarily a continuation of the street naming system of Washington, D. C. The base lines for the new system are North Capitol Street and East Capitol Street in Washington. These streets radiate north and east from the U. S. Capitol, and form the two inner boundaries of that city's northeast section. East from North Capitol are a series of numbered (north-south) streets which continue beyond the Washington, D. C. boundary into Maryland suburbs to numbers as high as 95th Avenue. North of East Capitol Street, the system consists of several zones of east-west streets arranged in alphabetical order. (1) A zone of streets named with letters of the alphabet, such as A Street, B Street, etc. (this is in Washington, D. C. only), (2) then alphabetized two-syllable names of famous Americans, such as Adams Street, and Bryant Street (this zone is located almost entirely in Washington, D. C., but some streets cross into Mount Rainier, Bladensburg, and Brentwood, Maryland.) (3) The next zone consists of alphabetized three-syllable names of famous Americans, such as Allison Street, Buchanan Street, etc., (these names are used in Northern Washington D. C., and in Hyattsville, Riverdale, and Edmonston, Maryland and vicinity.) (4) The next zone extending into Maryland contains the alphabetized names of colleges, Austin Road, Clemson Road, and so forth. (5) The next zone consists of alphabetized Indian names, such as Apache Street, Blackfoot Street, etc., and is in Maryland only.

Monroe County, New York , at the request of the smaller municipalities within its area, undertook the job of eliminating duplication of street and road names, and of establishing a pattern of house numbering. Over two hundred duplicate names were discovered and eliminated. The new pattern was dovetailed into that previously established for Rochester, where numbers were formerly established on the basis of 15 feet per number. This was extended through the towns surrounding the central city, until all old subdivisions with lot frontages of less than 50 feet had been included. In the area of new subdivisions, where 50 foot lots have been required, the numbers were based on 50 feet intervals. Arterial highways originating in Rochester were given the same name for their entire length to the county line, and were given numbers on a continuous basis, the lower numbers nearer to the center of the town. Where incorporated villages had adopted another numbering system, the county numbering system was established so that the incorporated villages could join the county system when they chose to do so.

The Lyman or Salt Lake City System

The Lyman Uniform Street Numbering System was developed by Richard R. Lyman, a consulting civil engineer, and has been adopted by Salt Lake City and County, Utah, by St. George, Utah, and by Sacramento, California, among other cities, and was proposed by the Weber County-Ogden City Planning Commission. Some of the features of this plan have also been incorporated in Los Angeles, California and Kansas City, Missouri. This system utilizes a grid, with base line streets dividing the city into east, west, north and south portions. Streets are given numbers, instead of street names, with an increase in the size of the numbers, the greater the distance from the base lines.

Curved and crooked streets, and other streets deviating from the basic grid pattern may fit into this pattern of street numbering. For example, in the illustration used below, which appeared in the American City in the issue of September 1942, an irregular street will have as many "number" names as necessary. In the first example, the diagonal street from point A to point B, is considered as an east-west street and is called 624 North Street at one end, and 675 North Street at the other (since the street originates on the even numbered side on one block and runs through to the odd numbered side on the other end of the block, the numbers differ accordingly). The residents would choose as a street address whatever street name was closest to their home. If this street were to be continued in a diagonal direction, it would have a new numbered name at each intersection, corresponding to its geographic location. In the second example, a street running from points C to D to E would be in part an east-west street, and in part, a north-south street, and would be numbered accordingly.

House Rural Numbering

In rural communities, it is suggested that numbers be based on fractions of a mile, indicating the distance not only from the point of origin of the road, but also from other properties along that road. In a system described in the New York State Planning News of June 8, 1949, it is proposed that the house numbers indicate the hundredths of a mile the property is located from the origin of the road. This system is geared to the automobile and the speedometer, since a motorist may locate a property by watching his mileage gauge. The numbers begin at the end of the road nearest the city, village, or post office, or where the road joins a more important highway. There would be a hundred units to each mile or about 53 feet to a unit. Since odd numbers are used on one side of the road, and even on the other, there should actually be numbers running from 1–200 for the first mile. The way the system is reported in the article, only numbers 1–100 are applicable for the first mile, evidently assuming that the area will not be so built up to require use of all the numbers. In an article in the February 1950 American City , numbers 1–999 are used for each mile section of the road, and since odd numbers are on one side and even on the other, a number can be assigned to each 10-1/2 feet of frontage and can thus be carried through built-up communities as well as the rural areas. This is the system that has been adopted by Fresno County, California. A base point was established in the City of Fresno, which is located approximately in the center of the county, and north-south, and east-west lines established, with one mile square sections marked off in grid fashion. In an example given, an address 6238 West Rural Road could be located by consulting a directory for the location of the Rural Road, and the property would be located a little more than 6.2 miles west of the base line.

Street Naming and House Numbering in New Subdivisions

An example of street naming and house numbering in a modern subdivision with a curvilinear street pattern is that of Park Forest, Illinois. In Park Forest, the new community development south of Chicago, one of the designation problems involved making a decision as to which of two streets to use in giving the unit an address. The buildings — row houses — are grouped around parking bays, and the units actually face neither street. The sketch shows how this and some of the other numbering problems were handled.

Professor Eugene Van Cleef has described a system of house numbering on irregular streets, within a larger framework of a gridiron street pattern, in the February, 1950 issue of American City . A house derives its street address from its location in respect to the two nearest major arteries.

Pertinent Court Decisions

In the case of Hagerty v. Chicago , 195 N.E. 652 (Illinois) the court held that an ordinance changing the name or a street under statutory authority is not invalid as unreasonable. Under the Laws of 1911, the common council of cities, and the president and board of trustees in villages are expressly authorized to name and change the name of any street, avenue, alley, or other public place. The property owner abutting the street was found to have no property right in the name of the street which would prevent the municipality from changing the name of the street.

According to Bacon v. Miller , 160 N.E. 381 (New York) names of streets and numbers of houses may be changed since there is no vested right in the name of a street or in a number originally assigned. The court also found that although renaming and renumbering streets is inherently a local matter, it cannot be done arbitrarily, but must be done in good faith.

In Ohio, the court held that in Miller v. Cincinnati , 10 Ohio Dec. 423, 21 Cin. Law Bul. 121, if no good cause exists for changing the name of a street, the municipality cannot change it accept on petition of the abutting owners.

In Brown v. Topeka 74 P. (2d) 142, it was held that a city had the implied authority to change the name of a street.

However, when streets are deeded to a city or village, the deed conveying the street may restrict the grantee's right to change its name according to Belden v. Niagara Falls , 136 Misc. 406, 241 N.Y.S. 5.

Naming streets is a legislative act and not a judicial act, according to Darling v. Jersey City , 78 A. 10 (New Jersey), and is not subject to review by or interference from the courts. Also, in Eldridge v. Fawcett , 223 P. 1040 (Washington) it was found that the right to change the name of a street is a legislative right which is not exhausted by previous exercise thereof.

In Norwood Heights Improvement Association Inc., v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore et al ., 72 A. (2d) 1, (Maryland, 1950), the Association appealed a decision of the Board of Municipal and Zoning Appeals, objecting, among other things, to the house numbers to be given to several apartment buildings. The court dismissed the appeal, and, among other things, stated that the zoning ordinance had nothing to do with the numbering of new houses.

Sample Ordinance

Model ordinances for establishing street naming and house numbering systems have been proposed by the League of South Dakota Municipalities, in its Bulletin of November, 1936, and by the League of Wisconsin Municipalities in The Municipality , February, 1941.

Tucson, Arizona, proposed a new system in 1949; the suggested ordinance is reproduced below to indicate types of provisions which may be included in such an ordinance.

"An Ordinance Establishing A Uniform System For Numbering Buildings And Streets, Naming Streets, Establishing Base Streets and Designations For Numbering And Naming Purposes, Providing The Methods For Instituting Said System, And For The Enforcement Thereof.

"The Mayor and Council of the City of Tucson do ordain as follows: "SECTION 1. There is hereby established a uniform system for numbering buildings fronting on all streets, avenues, and public ways in the City of Tucson, and all houses and other buildings shall be numbered in accordance with the provisions of this ordinance. "SECTION 2. Speedway shall constitute the base line for numbering buildings along all streets running northerly and southerly; and Pioneer Boulevard, as hereinafter named and established, shall constitute the base line for numbering buildings along all streets running easterly and westerly. "( 1) Each building north of Speedway, and facing a street running in a northerly direction shall carry a number and address indicating its location north of said base street. "(2) Each building south of Speedway, and facing a street running in a southerly direction shall carry a number and address indicating its location south of said base street. "(3) Each building east of Pioneer Boulevard, and facing a street running in an easterly direction shall carry a number and address indicating its location east of said base street. "(4) Each building west of Pioneer Boulevard, and facing a street running in a westerly direction shall carry a number and address indicating its location west of said base street. "(5) All buildings on diagonal streets shall be numbered the same as buildings on northerly and southerly streets if the diagonal runs more from the north to the south, and the same rule shall apply on easterly and westerly streets if the diagonal runs more from the east to the west. All buildings on diagonal streets having a deviation of exactly forty-five (45) degrees, shall be numbered the same as buildings on northerly and southerly streets. "SECTION 3. The numbering of buildings on each street shall begin at the base line. All numbers shall be assigned on the basis of one thousand (1000) numbers to each mile, or one thousand (1000) numbers between established section lines or the streets located thereon, and where practicable two numbers shall be assigned to each ten and fifty-six hundredths (10.56) feet of occupied frontage. "SECTION 4.(a) All buildings on the right-hand side of each street running from the base street shall bear even numbers. All buildings on the left-hand side of each street running from the base street shall bear odd numbers. "(b) Where any building has more than one entrance serving separate occupants, a separate number shall be assigned to each entrance serving a separate occupant providing said building occupies a lot, parcel, or tract having a frontage equal to 10.56' for each such entrance. If the building is not located on a lot, parcel, or tract which would permit the assignment of one number to each such entrance, numerals and letters shall be used, as set forth in Section 8 herein. "SECTION 5. All buildings facing streets not extending through to the base line shall be assigned the same relative numbers as if the said street had extended to the said base line. "SECTION 6. In addition to the numbers placed on each house or other building as heretofore provided, all streets, avenues, and other public ways within said city are hereby given numbers and directional symbols according to their distance and direction from the two base streets set forth in Section 2 herein. "(a) All streets approximately parallel to and north of Speedway are given the direction North. All streets approximately parallel to and south of Speedway are given the direction South. All streets approximately parallel to and east of Pioneer Boulevard are given the direction East. All streets approximately parallel to and west of Pioneer Boulevard are given the direction West. "(b) East street shall bear a number or numbers corresponding with the one-tenth (1/10) of a mile in which said street is located at any given point. If said street is not parallel with either base street, then its number shall vary in the case of each address on said street according to the distance said address is from both base streets. Each house or other building in addition to the number or numbers given it under Section 4 herein shall also bear the number and direction of the street on which it is located.

"SECTION 7(a). The Mayor and Council shall cause the necessary survey to be made and completed within six (6) months from the date of the adoption of this ordinance and thereafter there shall be assigned to each house and other residential or commercial building located on any street, avenue, or public way in said city, its respective number under the uniform system provided for in this ordinance according to said survey. When the said survey shall have been completed and each house or building has been assigned its respective number or numbers; the owner, occupant, or agent shall place or cause to be placed upon each house or building controlled by him the number or numbers assigned under the uniform system as provided in this ordinance.

"(b) Such number or numbers shall be placed on existing buildings on or before the effective date of this ordinance, and within twenty (20) days after the assigning of the proper number in the case of numbers assigned after the effective date of this ordinance. The cost of the number or numbers shall be paid for by the property owner and may be procured either from the street superintendent at the unit price for the same, such price to be the cost of such units to the city, or from any other source. Replacement of numbers shall be procured and paid for by the owner. The numbers used shall be not less than three (3) inches in height and shall be made of a durable and clearly visible material. If the proper number is not placed on an existing building on or before the effective date of this ordinance, it shall be the duty of the superintendent of streets to install the proper number or numbers on said premises as hereinafter set forth, and to make a charge of five dollars ($5.00) for each number so installed; which said charge shall become a lien against the premises on which said building is located, and shall be added to the city real estate tax on said premises for the ensuing year.

"(c) The numbers shall be conspicuously placed immediately above, on, or at the side of the proper door of each building so that the number can be seen plainly from the street line. Whenever any building is situated more than fifty feet from the street line, near the walk, driveway, or common entrance to such building and upon a gate post, fence, tree, post, or other appropriate place so as to be easily discernible from the sidewalk.

"SECTION 8. Where only one number can be assigned to any house or building, the owner, occupant, or agent of such house or building, who shall desire distinctive numbers for the upper and lower portion of any house or building, or for any part of any such house or building fronting on any street; such owner, occupant, or agent shall use the suffix (A), (B), (C), etc. as may be required.

"SECTION 9. For the purpose of facilitating a correct numbering, a plat book of all streets, avenues, and public ways within the city showing the proper numbers of all houses or other buildings fronting upon all streets, avenues, or public ways shall be kept on file in the office of the city superintendent of streets. These plats shall be open to inspection of all persons during the office hours of the superintendent. Duplicate copies of such plats shall be furnished to the engineer and building inspector by the city superintendent of streets.

"SECTION 10. It shall be the duty of the city superintendent of streets to inform any party applying therefore of the number or numbers belonging to or embraced within the limits of any said lot or property as provided in this ordinance. In case of conflict as to the proper number to be assigned to any building, the said superintendent shall determine the number of such building.

"SECTION 11. Whenever any house, building, or structure shall be erected or located in the City of Tucson after the establishment of a uniform system of house and building numbering has been completed, in order to preserve the continuity and uniformity of numbers of the houses, buildings, and structures, it shall be the duty of the owner to procure the correct number or numbers as designated from the city superintendent of streets for the said property and to immediately fasten the said number or numbers so assigned upon said building as provided by this ordinance. No building permit shall be issued for any house, building, or structure until the owner has procured from the superintendent of streets the official number of the premises. Final approval of any structure erected, repaired, altered, or modified after the effective date of this ordinance shall be withheld by the city building inspector until permanent and proper numbers have been affixed to said structure.

"SECTION 12. There is hereby established a uniform system of street naming in the City of Tucson, and all streets, avenues, and other dedicated public ways shall be named in accordance with the provisions of this ordinance.

"(a) All streets and other public ways running in the same direction and having a deviation of not more than 125 feet, shall carry the same name unless special circumstances make such a plan impracticable or not feasible. "(b) All through east and west streets shall carry the designation 'street' and all through north and south streets shall carry the designation 'avenue,' except for thoroughfares on section lines. "(c) All through thoroughfares running north and south on section lines shall be designated as 'boulevards.' "(d) All through thoroughfares running east and west on section lines shall be designated as 'ways,' such as Speedway, Broadway, etc. "(e) That part of any street ending in a 'dead-end,' or cul-de-sac, shall carry the designation 'place.' "(f) The name 'lane' shall be used in any residential or business development for any north and south alley street which bisects or crosses a nominal block or series of blocks, and the name 'row' for any such east and west alley street. "(g) Any street or portion thereof, running in a straight line for more than 500 feet, which moves at an angle of more than 20 degrees from a true north-south or east-west pattern, shall be designated, wherever practicable, as 'stravenue.' "(h) Any street which curves in an irregular pattern to an extent that its east-west or north-south direction is changed, shall be designated as 'paseo.' "(i) A short street that does not continue through, running east and west, shall be designated as 'calle.' Such a short street running north and south shall be designated as 'via.' "(j) No street established or named after the adoption of this ordinance shall bear a name in a language in conflict with its destination. "(k) The Mayor and Council may adopt further designations or any additional rules and regulations which may be required from time to time upon recommendations of the Planning and Zoning Commission by amending this section.

"SECTION 13. For the purpose of clarifying and systematizing the present street naming pattern in the City of Tucson and to implement the application of the matters set forth in Section 12 herein, there is hereby adopted the following plan.

"(a) The Planning and Zoning Commission of said city is hereby authorized to prepare and present to the Mayor and Council a complete plan for the naming of all streets, avenues, and public ways within said city. "(b) Said Planning and Zoning Commission shall follow the general plan set forth in Section 12 herein and such other rules as are herein set forth. "(c) If said Commission shall find an existing street now carrying more than one name, it shall recommend that said street shall bear the name under which it currently travels the longest distance both inside and outside of the city limits of said city unless circumstances indicate that another and different name would be desirable. Said Commission if it sees fit, may hold public hearings at which interested property owners may express their views concerning the changing of the name or names of any street. "(d) For the purpose of establishing a north and south base street, for numbering and naming purposes, the present existing north and south First Avenue and the extensions thereof is hereby named and designated as Pioneer Boulevard and is hereby established as the north and south base street for the purpose of this ordinance. "(e) The north and south bound streets west of said Pioneer Boulevard, which are named Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, Twelfth, Thirteenth. Fourteenth, Fifteenth, and Sixteenth Avenues, are hereby renamed in a manner to be determined by the Mayor and Council upon recommendation of said Commission, so that the present conflict between numbered streets and numbered avenues is eliminated.

"SECTION 14. Every subdivision plat submitted to the Mayor and Council for their approval after the effective date of this ordinance shall bear upon its face the report of the Planning and Zoning Commission of the proper names of any and all streets, avenues, and public ways hereafter dedicated to public use within the jurisdiction of the Mayor and Council shall first be checked by the Planning and Zoning Commission as to their names under the provisions of this ordinance.

"SECTION 15. This ordinance and all house and building numbers assigned under the provisions thereof, and all street numbers and names established by said ordinance shall become effective one year from the date the Mayor and Council of said city shall by resolution accept and ratify the recommendations made by the Planning and Zoning Commission for the names of all streets, avenues, and public ways within said City, and shall determine that the superintendent of streets has completed the survey required by Section 7 of this ordinance.

"SECTION 16. The Mayor and Council by resolution may change, rename, or name an existing or newly established street within the limits of said city at any time after the adoption of this ordinance upon recommendation of the Planning and Zoning Commission, and after consultation with the Board of Supervisors, the County Planning Agency, and any other municipality directly affected thereby."

Copyright, American Society of Planning Officials, 1950.  

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How to find your house number in numerology + what it says about your home.

In the ancient system of numerology, it's believed that numbers, letters, and their vibrations can impact our own lives, purposes, and paths. You may already know your life path or destiny number, for instance, but in numerology, your house number matters too. Here's why, how to find yours, plus what it means.

Why do house numbers matter in numerology?

According to numerologist and author of  You Are Cosmic Code   Kaitlyn Kaerhart , the street number of your house speaks to the energy of the home itself.

"This number helps us understand the personality of our home and the themes that may arise during our time there," she explains, adding, "Knowing this number can help guide you in choosing the appropriate home for your needs and even shift the vibration of your current residence."

How to calculate the numerology of your home

Calculating numbers in numerology involves a process of reducing larger numbers until you get a single digit. To do this, you add up all the digits in the number, and if the sum is still two digits or more, you continue reducing until you get to a single digit from 1 through 9, or in rare cases, master numbers 11, 22, and 33.

If you live in an apartment, all you need is your apartment number, according to Kaerhart. For example, if you live in apartment #2 in your building, your home is a 2 home. Essentially, "You live within the energy of the 2," Kaerhart explains.

Now, if you live in apartment #813, 8 + 3 + 1 = 12, and 1 + 2 = 3, so this apartment number would be a 3 home in numerology.

If you live in a house, you use the actual number of your street address, using the same process to reduce to a single digit. If you live at 744 Rose Boulevard, for instance, then you live in a home with the energy of a 6 (7 + 4 + 4 = 15, and 1 + 5 = 6).

House numbers in numerology & their meanings

House number 1.

The number 1 in numerology is all about new beginnings, and house numbers are no exception. According to Kaerhart, 1 homes are a place to start anew and embrace your creativity, independence, and autonomy.

They're excellent for entrepreneurs and those who are single, she notes, adding that this is a home where you will "be more focused on the self, as opposed to others—so if you are looking to partner up, this may not be the home for you."

House number 2

Unlike the independent energy of the 1, the number 2 in numerology is very relationship-oriented. As Kaerhart tells mindbodygreen, partnership and balance flourish in 2 homes, with this energy supporting collaboration, emotional exploration, and comfort.

"[It's] perfect for having people over and gathering with loved ones," she says, and thanks to this home's balanced energy, she adds, conflict doesn't typically occur often here.

House number 3

The 3 is the number of communication and socializing in numerology, so if you live in a 3 home, expect plenty of both. As Kaerhart explains, 3 is the number of self-expression, so this is a very supportive home for artists or anyone whose work involves expression.

"Socializing, entertaining, parties, and eccentric people will be present here," according to Kaerhart, who notes to be careful you don't get too caught up in the fast-paced energy of the 3, lest you become ungrounded or scattered.

House number 4

If 3 homes can be ungrounded, 4 homes are the opposite, with Kaehart telling mindbodygreen that this is a very practical and grounded space. The energy here will support structure, responsibilities, and growing the foundations of your life as well, she says, adding, "This is not a house of change but rather, consistency, stability, and hard work."

One caveat, however, is feeling boxed in or restricted in this home, she says. If that happens, Kaerhart recommends incorporating some feng shui practices, plants, and anything that allows energy to flow.

House number 5

The number 5 in numerology is all about change, and that's what you can expect in a 5 home. According to Kaerhart, anything goes in these spaces, and you should prepare for adventure, travel, and yes, unexpected changes. If you want a cozier, more stable vibe, this home might not be the place for you, Kaerhart notes.

However, if you want action, variety, exploration, freedom, and a bit of risk, you might just thrive here. But be warned, Kaerhart cautions, "Sometimes the 5 can be a bit of a hedonist, so make sure you find balance within your life instead of going to extremes."

House number 6

An ideal home for families, Kaerhart says the energy of the 6 home is a beautiful place to have children or get married. "This is a warm, cozy home where relationships, love, and healing are at the forefront," she tells mindbodygreen.

While a balance of nurturing and your job is possible here, she does note that you may feel overwhelmed by your sense of duty and responsibilities to your loved ones. "Be careful not to drain yourself by overgiving and to nurture yourself before others," she says, adding, "This is also a home you may want to hermit in."

House number 7

The number of introspection and spiritual seekers, 7 homes are not spaces for socializing, according to Kaerhart. Rather, this is a home for gathering knowledge and decompressing. "You will be more internal than ever in this sanctuary, which is deeply meditative and spiritual," she adds.

If you're more introverted, or focused on something like writing a book or going back to school, Kaerhart tells mindbodygreen that this would be the perfect house number for you. "This is a home to answer your sacred calling and dive deep into the depths of what truly matters to you on a soul level," she adds.

House number 8

In numerology, 8 is considered a number of abundance , but too much of anything can be too much. As Kaerhart explains, "Money and power will thrive here, for better and possibly for worse—make sure you are nurturing yourself in both areas and exerting power in a healthy way."

That said, if you're really focused on your job, this could be a very conducive environment for you. "This is a home to prosper and grow in, specifically when it comes to the material realm," Kaerhart says, adding, "The downside of this energy is that you can be prone to being a workaholic, or not know when enough is enough, especially when it comes to financial matters."

House number 9

Last but not least, the number 9 relates to endings but also humanitarianism. Kaerhart notes that, as such, this could be a home where literal or metaphorical endings occur, with 9 representing completion and letting go.

However, it's also a very warm and nurturing home where everyone will feel welcome. "As the 9 is the humanitarian's number, selflessness, forgiveness, compassion, and dedicating yourself to a cause (i.e., perhaps your home is a place where you foster animals) are very much supported here," Kaerhart explains.

How do I find my house numerology?

To find your numerology house number add up the digits of your street address until you reduce it to a single digit between 1 and 9. If you live in an apartment, use your apartment number.

What do house numbers represent?

In numerology, house numbers help us understand the personality of our home and the themes that may arise during our time there.

What is the number 1 house in numerology?

The number 1 in numerology is all about new beginnings, and house numbers are no exception. These homes are a place to start anew and embrace your creativity, independence, and autonomy.

The takeaway

Numerology can clue us in to everything from our life path to who we're most compatible with . And in the case of your house number, it can reveal the energy of your home and the themes you'll encounter while living there.

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American house numbering conventions may 4, 2004 9:05 am   subscribe.

Search Hunter's Query

Understanding how congressional bills are numbered.

When locating the original text of Congressional bills, it is important to understand how Congressional bills are numbered.

Each bill is assigned a number in sequential order when it is introduced into Congress. The bill is given a prefix to indicate the chamber of Congress it was introduced in. Bills introduced in the House of Representatives have the prefix “H.R.” while bills introduced in the Senate have the prefix “S.”

A new Congress is convened every two years and is given a number in chronological order beginning with the number “1” for the first Congress convened in 1789 after the ratification of the constitution. Since then, every new Congress has convened in an odd year. The current Congress, the 118th, convened in January 2023 and will run through December 2024. The previous Congress (the 117th) convened from 2021-2022.

Each time a new Congress is convened, the numbering of bills restarts. As of today, February 17, 2023, the House of Representatives is already up to H.R.1055 and counting ! Because the numbering of bills restarts, there will be an H.R.1 and an S.1 for each of the 117 previously convened Congresses in addition to the current Congress. Thus, researchers trying to locate a bill by its number must know the number of the Congress it was introduced in or be prepared to look through a lot of bills.

Knowing the year the bill was introduced works too. Research tools that give you the option to search by bill number provide both the date range and the number of the Congress together, making it easy to locate the correct Congress to search.

Two of the best tools for locating bills by number include Congress.gov (free, but has some coverage gaps) and ProQuest Congressional Legislative & Executive Publications (available to all current BYU students and library visitors). If you have any trouble locating a bill, contact the library reference desk .

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• Chapter V: Address Processing

V.2 Address Numbers (‘House’ Numbers), Normalization and Formats: HNI, HNS and HND

Address numbers identify buildings, and are combined with street names and addressable place names ( see Chapter III.6 ) or with street codes (as surrogates of street names or place names) to form addresses. Address numbers are commonly called ‘house’ numbers (although this term is a misnomer, since many addresses refer to buildings other than houses). To be consistent with common parlance and with other Geosupport documentation, the term ‘house number’ will be used instead of ‘address number’ in the remainder of this document, except in literal citations of Geosupport reject messages, since those messages use the term ‘address number’.

Applications can pass a house number to any of the address-processing functions in character form, in the 12-byte WA1 input House Number field for MSW and the 16-byte WA1 input House Number field for COW. A house number passed in this manner need not be in any particular format, but could be a ‘raw’, un-formatted house number. Alternatively, house numbers can be passed in a 6-byte WA1 input field in a special Geosupport format called the House Number in Internal format (HNI), which presumes, the application will have obtained the HNI from a previous Geosupport call. HNIs are only used with MSW. A newer Geosupport format called House Number in Sort Format (HNS) is used for COWs.

When a house number is passed to Geosupport in the 12-byte WA1 for MSW or the 16-byte WA1 for COW input House Number field, Geosupport normalizes it. The house number normalization algorithm is complex, and a full description of it is beyond the scope of this document, but some aspects are discussed below. If normalization is successful, an output normalized house number is produced in two standard formats, the 12-byte or 16-byte output House Number in Display format (HND) and the 6-byte output House Number in Internal format (HNI) or the 11-byte House Number in Sort format (HNS), and both of these are returned to the application in WA1. The HND is in character form and is suitable for display, for example, on application screens, reports and mailing labels.  While the HNS format contains character data, it is intended for Geosupport internal use. To conserve space, users may store this value in their files.

The HNI format contains packed decimal data, and is the format that Geosupport uses internally to perform its address-matching routines. The HNI is not documented in detail herein, and is of little direct relevance to most users. However, to conserve disk space in application files in which house numbers must be stored in some form, users can store the 6-byte HNI in their files rather than the 12-byte HND for MSW or the 11-byte HNS in their files rather than the 16-byte HND for COW, and then use any of the display functions, Functions D, DG and DN, to obtain the house number in HND format for display, as described below.

Processing of HNIs or HNSs by the Display Functions

The processing of an input HNI or HNS by a display function consists only of forming and outputting the HND. The successful processing of an input HNI or HNS by a display function implies that the HNI or HNS conforms to Geosupport’s format requirements for HNIs or HNSs, but does not imply that the HNI or the HNS forms part of a valid address.

The display functions can process up to two input HNI or HNS values in a single call, using the two input HNI or HNS fields and two output HND fields in WA1. If two input HNIs or HNSs are supplied, they are processed independently of each other and are not treated as forming an address range. If only one input HNI or HNS is supplied, it may be passed in either of the input HNI or HNS fields.

The display functions return one output HND for each validly formatted input HNI or HNS. For each input HNI or HNS that is invalid, the display functions return all question marks (the character ‘?’) in the corresponding output HND field. In addition, if at least one input HNI or HNS is invalid, the GRC value ‘13’, Reason Code value ‘9’ and corresponding Message are issued.

The display functions can also be used to obtain street names corresponding to input street codes. (The processing of street codes by the display functions is discussed in detail in Chapter IV.6 .) In a single call, the display functions can process input HNIs or HNSs without input street codes, input street codes without HNIs or HNSs or both types of input. If both HNIs or HNSs and street codes are provided as input data to a display function call, they are processed independently of each other and are not treated as forming an address. In particular, the display functions perform no address validation.

HNIs or HNSs as Input to the Address-Processing Functions

The user has the option of providing input house numbers to the address-processing functions in the form of an HNI or HNS instead of a ‘raw’ unprocessed house number. This feature is useful for processing an application file that already contains house numbers in HNI or HNS format from a previous pass through Geosupport. The use of this feature slightly improves execution efficiency by allowing Geosupport to circumvent the house number normalization routine.

House Number Format Standards

'Raw' (un-normalized) input house numbers must conform to certain Geosupport standards, which are based on the characteristics of New York City’s addresses. If an input house number does not satisfy these standards, Geosupport is unable to normalize it and rejects the call. The house number standards include the following, among others:

• Conformance to a set of allowable characters

• A limitation on the total length of the ‘basic house number’ (this term and the term ‘house number suffix’ are defined below)

• Limitations on the number of digits and maximum numeric values of the basic house number, if it does not contain a hyphen; or such limitations on the portions of the basic house number preceding and following the hyphen, if a hyphen is present

• Validity of the house number suffix (discussed below), if one is present

Every valid New York City house number conforms to the above standards.

The ability of Geosupport to normalize an input house number does not by itself signify that that house number, together with the input borough and street, form in combination a valid New York City address. Successful normalization signifies only that the input house number conforms to Geosupport’s house number format criteria. Only the successful completion of a two-work-area call to one of the address-processing functions has significance with respect to the geographic validity of the input address. ( See Chapter II.4 for a discussion of the distinction between the validations performed by one- and two-work-area calls.)

New York City house numbers consist of a ‘basic house number’, possibly followed by a ‘house number suffix’. (Note: the basic house number and house number suffix are not to be confused with the digits to the left and right of the hyphen in a hyphenated house number. For example, in the Queens address ‘240-55 1/3 DEPEW AVENUE’, ‘240-55’ is the basic house number, and is hyphenated; ‘1/3’ is the house number suffix.) A dash character may appear in the input house number field between the basic house number and the house number suffix, e.g. 22-GARAGE. Geosupport replaces the dash with a blank and processing continues. No message is generated for this situation.

Only a small percentage of New York City addresses have house number suffixes. The following are some examples of valid New York City addresses containing house number suffixes (highlighted in bold type):

Input basic house numbers may contain a dash(the character ‘-‘), which can serve either as a hyphen , as with most house numbers in Queens and some house numbers in other boroughs, or as a range separator .

• House Number Ranges : Addresses in New York City are often expressed in ranges, using a dash to separate the low and high house numbers of the range. For example, 22-28 Reade Street in Manhattan represents the range of even addresses consisting of 22 Reade Street, 24 Reade Street, 26 Reade Street and 28 Reade Street, all of which are valid individual addresses for the same building. In other words, in this example, the character string ‘22-28’ is not an individual house number, but represents a range of house numbers, in which the dash serves as a range separator, and the number to the left of the dash, 22, as well as that to the right of the dash, 28, constitute by themselves valid individual house numbers for Reade Street.

• Hyphenated House Numbers : Consider the Queens address 22-28 36th Street. The house number portion of the address, 22-28, consists of the same character string as the above Reade Street example, but it has a very different meaning in the two cases. In the Reade Street case, 22-28 represents a range of even house numbers; in the 36th Street case, 22-28 is a single hyphenated house number, not a range of several unhyphenated house numbers. In a hyphenated house number, the digits to the left and to the right of the hyphen in combination form a single house number; the digits on one side of the hyphen are not by themselves geographically meaningful. For example, 22 36th Street and 28 36th Street are not valid Queens addresses. In addition, the position of the hyphen within a hyphenated house number is significant. For example, consider the addresses 13-103 41st Avenue and 131-03 41st Avenue. These are two distinct addresses on the same Queens street, even though the house numbers consist of the same sequence of digits and differ only in the position of the hyphen.

Geosupport’s house number normalization algorithm interprets a dash encountered in an input house number either as a hyphen or as a range separation character, depending on the borough, the street (some streets do not conform to the norm for their borough with respect to house number hyphenation) and other criteria.

• When Geosupport interprets the dash as a range separation character : In normalizing the input house number, both the dash itself and the portion of the basic house number to the right of the dash are deleted. As one consequence of this, when the input to a two-work-area call is an address range, only the address formed from the house number to the left of the dash is validated; the house number to the right of the dash is ignored and no conclusion can be drawn about its validity from the success or failure of the call. For example, 22-28 Reade St in Manhattan is normalized as 22 READE STREET; the ‘28’ is ignored during normalization, and is not validated as an individual house number in a two-work-area call.

• When Geosupport interprets the dash as a hyphen : In normalizing the input house number, the digits on both sides of the hyphen are retained, as is the hyphen itself.

If Geosupport determines that an input house number in character form has a missing or inappropriately present dash, then whenever it is feasible, Geosupport modifies the house number to correct the error before normalizing it. (Geosupport never modifies input HNIs or HNSs.) Geosupport will make such a modification automatically (without user request), but only if the intended address is clear and unambiguous and is valid for the function being called, and a valid address could not be formed by normalizing the input house number in a different fashion. Two types of such dash-related modifications are as follows:

• When an input house number does not contain a dash, but Geosupport determines that the house number should be hyphenated : Geosupport inserts a hyphen, provided it can determine the proper position of the hyphen unambiguously so that a valid address results. For example, the input address 6603 Booth Street in Queens is normalized as 66-03 BOOTH STREET; the input address 63101 Alderton Street in Queens is normalized as 63-101 ALDERTON STREET.

• When an input house number contains a dash, but Geosupport determines that the presence of the dash is erroneous (i.e., the house number is invalid whether the dash is interpreted as a hyphen or as a range separator) : Geosupport concatenates the digits to the left and right of the dash without retaining the dash itself, provided that this results in a valid address. For example, 10-22 38th Street in Brooklyn is normalized as 1022 38 STREET.

Whenever the house number normalizer makes an assumption about, or a dash-related modification to, an input house number, Geosupport informs the calling application by issuing a warning condition. A warning is issued, for example, when Geosupport assumes that an input dash is a range separator and then normalizes the house number by deleting the dash and digits following it, or when it assumes that a required hyphen is missing and inserts one.

When Geosupport is unable to normalize an input house number without making a dash-related modification so that a valid address results, and there is more than one type of dash-related modification that would result in a valid address, the input is considered ambiguous. For such a rejection, the Message would list the possible valid forms of the input address. This assists the user to determine how the input house number should be modified to make it valid. For example, consider the input 10-14 Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. Lexington Avenue has unhyphenated addresses only. There are two reasonable interpretations of the user’s intended input in this example. These are 10 Lexington Avenue, which assumes the input is an address range, and 1014 Lexington Avenue, which assumes the dash is an inappropriately present hyphen. All of the address-processing functions consider both of these to be valid addresses. Initially, 10-14 Lexington Avenue in Manhattan was rejected as ambiguous, but, at user request, the first successful house number is accepted; i.e. 10 Lexington Avenue in Manhattan.

In the borough of Queens, the great majority of streets have hyphenated house numbers only; a few streets have unhyphenated house numbers only, and a few streets have ‘mixed hyphenation’(i.e., both hyphenated and unhyphenated house numbers). In the other four boroughs, all but a few streets have unhyphenated house numbers only, a few streets have hyphenated house numbers only, and a few streets have mixed hyphenation. Riverside Drive in Manhattan is an example of a mixed-hyphenation street. A small stretch of Riverside Drive running north from West 156th Street has hyphenated even addresses ranging from 156-00 to 159- 34 (with some gaps). The remainder of Riverside Drive has unhyphenated addresses only.

Information on the address hyphenation status of each of the city’s streets is maintained internally within Geosupport. The house number normalizer makes use of this information when analyzing an input house number that contains a dash character. Dash analysis is particularly complex for mixed-hyphenation streets, for which a dash could be either a hyphen or a range separator. For example, 156-158 Riverside Drive is a valid range of unhyphenated addresses assigned to a building located near West 88th Street, while 156-10 Riverside Drive is a valid single hyphenated address assigned to a building located near West 156th Street.

When there are more than 3 digits following the dash in an input address number on a street having unhyphenated or mixed hyphenated house numbers, Geosupport treats the dash as a range separation character and issues a warning message that the address number has been altered (GRC 01 / Reason 1). When this input occurs on a street having only hyphenated house numbers, the call is rejected and Geosupport issues an error message (GRC 13 / Reason 2).

Canadian Urbanism Uncovered

Ever wonder how a house gets an address number?

Read more articles by Amber Daugherty

March 11, 2013 March 11, 2013

You can tell a lot about a building by its number. Depending on what city you’re in, a street address can indicate distance from a body of water or major street, proximity to the nearest arterial, or which side of the road you’re on. Canadian cities all have their own systems for assigning numbers. Here are details on how the systems work in Vancouver, Calgary, Montréal, and Toronto.

How does it work?

Laid out in grid patterns, these four cities all have an intersection that represents zero, and numbers increase upward and outward from there. Vancouver’s is Ontario/ Carrall Street and Dundas Street. Calgary’s is Centre Street and Memorial Drive, Montréal’s is St. Laurent Boulevard and the St. Lawrence River, and Toronto’s is Yonge Street and Lake Ontario.

Vancouver, Montréal, and Calgary are all similar in that each city block is assigned 100 numbers — so the first buildings on the block will have a number ending in “01” (or close to it), ascending to “99.” The digits in front of that indicate how many blocks each block is from the centre. In Calgary, where streets are numerically named, it’s even easier; the first digits represent the street the building is closest to. So, a building numbered 3420 is number 20 on the block and closest to 34th Street. This means that a street that runs east–west through Centre Street will have virtually the same numbering as any street running parallel to it.

In Toronto, on the other hand, building numbers usually increase by two regardless of which block they’re on, so one block may have buildings numbered 384 and 402 on it.

Who assigns an address?

In Calgary, the City’s addressing officer is the one in charge of assigning new building numbers. In Vancouver, that job belongs to the chief building official. In Toronto, Wally Kowalenko is the city surveyor and director of the survey and mapping department. He says Toronto’s numbering breaks down in a few areas because the city is a collection of amalgamated cities. “There were a number of inconsistencies,” he explains, “and we couldn’t very well undo them, so we just live with the inconsistencies as best we can. I like to think we have relatively consistent policies now in place.”

Montréal is divided into 19 boroughs, and each has its own numbering bylaw and permit officers to issue them. Sylvain Daoust, permit officer in the borough of Ville-Marie, says although each borough has the power to do something different, not many do. “Most of the boroughs in Montréal have the same bylaw or numbering, which is quite simple.”

What if you want to change your building’s number?

Some numbers have deep significance in certain cultures, which can impact the resale value of a property. As a result, sometimes an owner will seek to change a building’s number.

In Calgary, you must pay $735 to the city for one address number change. If you are changing multiple addresses, the charge is a $735 base fee and then $86 per additional address.

In Vancouver, like other cities, you must be the registered property owner to request a number change. The cost is $690.

In Montréal, you don’t have the option of changing your number. Because numbers are assigned according to where your door is located in relation to the other doors on the street, changing one would mean changing all of them. The exception would be a building with a wide façade, such as an office building. In a case where a door position moves significantly, or a new one is added, a number can be assigned, which costs $56.50 plus taxes. If a number is removed in this case, it cannot be used again. It exists and will be attached to that building, whether it is used or not.

In Toronto, if the owner of a property wishes to change the address of a building, they have to pay $300, and then $29 for each additional address.

photo by Amber Daugherty

Interestingly, the following five Canadian cities assign different sets of numbers on different sides of their streets.

• South: even
• North: even

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11 comments

What bugs me is the lack of 4 or 13 as address numbers because of superstitions.

At least in the older part of Toronto, not only are the street numbers not tied to blocks or distance, but you can have dramatically different numbers on opposite sides of the street. I used to rent an even-numbered apartment on Queen Street East, east of Woodbine. The corresponding odd-numbered address was 500 metres to the west!

I got burned by my lack of understanding of Toronto’s numbering system shortly after I moved here. I had to pick up a package at an address that was about 154 Front St, and being familiar with the X-hundred block numbering systems of Vancouver and my home town, I assumed that meant it was just a block or two from Yonge St, and that I could just quickly walk there from the subway station, grab my package and head back on the train.

A block or two or nine.

And that was a heavy package.

Bathurst is the same way, especially between St Clair and Eglinton where it was an old municipal boundary. Just south of Eglinton, number 2000 is across the street from 1751.

You’re writing in English. Montreal does not take an accent-aigu when you are writing in English.

In some cities the addresses are defined by the old sideroads and “lines” that make up the grid … first street up marks 1000, second street up marks 2000, etc.

Toronto trivia:

You can usually expect even numbers on the west side of the street, but not at Bloor and Dundas. Fun!

Got hopelessly lost at bloor and dundas for 20 minutes walking back and forth due to believing this rule was everywhere :/

On the Island of Montreal, most of the former east-end suburban cities followed the Montreal numbering plan while the former west-end Suburban cities didn’t except for Verdun which went to the Montreal numbering system on east-west streets after WW-II (in the 50’s according to a friend). Montreal has had at least 2 major and 2 minor street renumberings in the the 1900-30 period when the City annexed a number smaller towns and villages. The last (minor) renumbering I can find was in the late 1930’s

Montréal is spelt with an acute accent.

a) In Calgary, you must know your quadrant of the city, or you may be miles from your address (SW, NW, SE, NE)… b) And the ‘zero’ starting point is very confusing if you are used to addressing in which the ‘first street/avenue’ has a number. c) But of course that ‘confusing’ is true of any unfamiliar city; it just takes time to figure it out.

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Getting a street number/address assigned to a vacant lot

I would like to acquire some land or a lot, preferably at a low price. Here's the thing: if I purchase a vacant lot, I would want an actual street number/address assigned to it by the city or town so that I can put up a mailbox and receive mail there. I've read mixed thoughts regarding the possibility of this. A few things I've read said that a structure is required on the lot in order to get a street number assigned. OK, well what about an 'outbuilding'? I could get one of those pre-fab sheds that are sold at Lowe's and Home Depot and put that on my lot. Would that qualify as a structure?

I guess the question is: how difficult is it usually to get a street number/address assigned to a vacant lot or raw land?

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• Planning Board

Addressing and Street Naming

An address is used to describe the specific location of a building, an apartment, or a plot of land. The most commonly used way to locate a specific property is the assigned premise address. Premise addresses are used daily by private citizens, postal service, delivery services, utility companies, Police Departments and Fire & Rescue Services to locate specific places. In general, street names are the reference point and the assigned number creates a unique identifier for each building.

Uniformity is a basic requirement to assure that any given property can be quickly and easily located. Since County residents rely on one central Police, Fire & Rescue dispatch center for public safety services, address assignment methodologies must be uniform throughout the County, regardless of whether the addresses are assigned by M-NCPPC or local jurisdictions. A community’s safety and welfare depends on the ability of emergency services to quickly locate every property.Addressing must be given a high priority during the development review process to assure consistency.

Addressing and Street Naming Authority

The Montgomery County Planning Department has been responsible for street names and address numbers in Montgomery County since the 1950’s. All requests for address assignments, address changes, revisions to address plans, and address verifications, as well as requests for street name approvals, assignments or changes, are reviewed by the Development Application and Regulatory Coordination (DARC) Division of the Montgomery County Planning Department for  Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission  (M-NCPPC). Requests may be approved if the request falls within the guidelines of this Manual in accordance with the following:  MD Code, Land Use, § 17-212  – Street names and house numbers;  MD Code, Land Use, § 20-202  – Powers and duties;  Montgomery County Code, Chapter 50 § 50-26(e)  – Street Names; Montgomery County Code Chapter 22 – Fire Safety Code; Section 22-97  – Address Numbers; and  Montgomery County Executive Regulation 29-08AM  – Fire Department Apparatus Access and Water Supply.

Under Maryland law, M-NCPPC is tasked with naming and renaming any street or highway and numbering and renumbering the houses in the area under its jurisdiction. This authority has been delegated to the County Planning Boards for their respective counties. Furthermore, under Montgomery County law, the Montgomery County Planning Board must approve any street name before it is used. Montgomery County Code, § 50-26(e). The Montgomery County Planning Board has in turn charged the Montgomery County Planning Department with the responsibility for addressing in Montgomery County, including adopting regulations to assure that there are reasonable procedures in place to i) correct mistakes, (ii) remove confusion because of a duplication of street names, and (iii) secure uniformity of street names and numbering of houses. MD Code, Land Use, § 17-212.

The four independent municipalities named below lie within the County but have authority to assign and approve street names and address numbers within the limits of their jurisdictions:

• City of Gaithersburg
• Town of Poolesville
• City of Rockville
• Town of Washington Grove

Although these municipalities implement their own street naming and addressing systems, coordination does occur between the municipalities and M-NCPPC. All four jurisdictions provide notices of address and street name assignments and changes to one another, as well as to various Montgomery County and State of Maryland agencies, and the U.S. Postal Service. Each jurisdiction has an addressing and street naming protocol in place to avoid duplications and conflicts of street names and addresses among the jurisdictions. The guidelines in this Manual will be limited to the addressing protocol and regulations applicable to M-NCPPC.

Information Counter 301-495-4610 Hours 9:00 a.m. – 3:30 p.m., Monday – Friday

Watch CBS News

Could House control flip to the Democrats? Early resignations leave GOP majority on edge

By Caitlin Yilek

March 29, 2024 / 6:00 AM EDT / CBS News

Washington — In mid-March, as the Republican majority in the House dwindled yet again, House Speaker Mike Johnson predicted that the series of resignations from frustrated GOP lawmakers had come to an end.

"I think, I hope and believe that's the end of the exits for now," the Louisiana Republican said after being caught off guard by Colorado Rep. Ken Buck's announcement that he would leave Congress on March 22.

Then, a week after Johnson's comments, Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, a rising GOP star, announced he was also stepping down early.

After Gallagher's departure on April 19, House Republicans will control 217 seats, compared to Democrats' 213. That will mean the GOP can afford to lose just a single vote, since 216 will constitute a majority if all members are present and voting.

While special elections should bolster their ranks in the coming months, Republicans could watch their majority slip away if just a handful of their colleagues head for the exits before their terms are up.

"With such a tiny majority, all it would take is a tiny number of Republicans to decide either they want to go and leave immediately, or they have some health crisis and they cannot serve, and then Democrats would at that point possibly have an operational majority," said Matthew Green, a politics professor at Catholic University.

It would be the first time control of the House has ever flipped in the middle of a congressional term. It has happened once in the Senate, in 2001. The closest parallel in the House came in 1930, when Republicans won a slim majority. But several members died and Democrats won special elections to replace them before the 72nd Congress convened in January 1931, denying the GOP control.

However, barring something unforeseen, Green said the chances of Democrats taking control of the lower chamber mid-Congress at this point are relatively low.

"The more likely outcome is that the Republicans will just kind of limp through the rest of this Congress with a tiny, tiny majority and not do a whole lot of legislating," he said. 

Molly Reynolds, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank that maintains a database of statistics on Congress, agreed it's unlikely that control suddenly flips to Democrats. But she said mid-session departures are more consequential because of the GOP's minuscule majority. 

"Even those folks who are really frustrated with serving in Congress right now, particularly in the Republican conference, even those folks don't want to jeopardize Republicans' ability to hold on to the majority," Reynolds said. 

If there are more early retirements, Reynolds said she expects they will be timed strategically around special elections, which are required under the Constitution to fill House vacancies. 

"Even in situations where the seat is safe for one party or the other, depending on the state it takes more or less time to actually effectuate an election to fill the seat," she said. "And that's the only way to fill a vacancy in the House."

The upcoming special elections are unlikely to jeopardize the GOP majority. Democrats are expected to hang on to a seat left vacant by Rep. Brian Higgins in New York during a special election in late April. Republicans are expected to retain three seats in the following months to fill the vacancies left by Buck; Kevin McCarthy of California , who resigned at the end of the year after he was ousted from the speakership ; and Bill Johnson of Ohio, now the president of Youngstown State University. Filling those vacancies would give the GOP majority a little more cushion. (There won't be a special election to fill Gallagher's seat, because he's resigning after the deadline to trigger one.)

Nineteen other Republicans have said they're retiring, are running for another office or have lost their primary. About two dozen Democrats have made similar announcements. So far, those lawmakers haven't indicated they plan to leave their current roles before the start of a new Congress in January. Then again, neither did Buck or Gallagher when they initially announced they wouldn't seek reelection. 

"The number of retirements is not unusual. What is unusual, is the number of retirements that are coming in the middle of a Congress," Green said. "It speaks in part to how deeply unhappy House Republicans are with being in Congress. They would rather just bail and not even fulfill their two-year obligation to their constituents than put up with being in the chamber any longer." 

After Easter, the House will return to more dysfunction spurred by Republican infighting, which could convince others to leave early. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has called for Johnson's removal from the speakership after he supported a massive spending bill to fund the government. With that threat hanging over him, Johnson will also have to navigate fractures within his party over sending more aid to Ukraine . 

"If Speaker Johnson is doing his job, he is talking to those announced retirees regularly, checking in to make sure they will not leave early," Green said. "The fact that the speaker was caught off guard by some of these early retirements doesn't speak well to his ability to keep his finger on the pulse of the conference."

A spokesperson for Johnson said the speaker and House GOP leadership "are in close communication with members, retiring and not, emphasizing the critical importance of protecting and defending the House Republican majority this year and growing the majority in the 2024 elections." 

• Mike Johnson
• Republican Party
• United States House of Representatives

Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at cbsnews.com and is based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation.

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How strong is a 4.8 earthquake? Quake magnitudes explained.

The 4.8 magnitude earthquake that struck New Jersey Friday generated shaking that could be felt from Washington, D.C. to north of Boston.

About 55 earthquakes a day – 20,000 a year – are recorded by the National Earthquake Information Center . Most are tiny and barely noticed by people living where they happen. Click here to see the USDA shake map for the most recent earthquakes.

Worldwide there are on average about 16 major earthquakes in any given year, 15 in the magnitude 7.0 range and one 8.0 or greater, according to records going back to 1900.

The United States typically has around 63 earthquakes of between magnitude 5.0 and 5.9 each year, according to USGS , about five between 6.0 and 6.9 and less than one between 7.0 and 7.9.

A major 7.4-magnitude earthquake hit Taiwan on Wednesday morning , killing 9 people and injuring over 1,000. The strongest earthquake there in a quarter century was followed by a series of aftershocks, reaching up to 6.4 magnitude.

More earthquakes are being recorded around the globe, but that doesn’t mean there are more earthquakes happening , according to the US Geological Survey. Instead, it’s because there are more measurement devices, called seismometers that record vibrations, which have been deployed in more places.

Earthquakes are a natural part of life on Earth, a geologically active planet , with seven major tectonic plates. These are continent-sized slabs of rock that glide over the planet’s mantle, constantly but very slowly reshaping the Earth’s landscape.

What does magnitude mean in an earthquake?

Magnitude is a measurement of the strength of an earthquake . Officially it's called the Moment Magnitude Scale . It's a logarithmic scale , meaning each number is ten times as strong as the one before it. So a 5.2 earthquake is moderate while a 6.2 is strong.

The magnitude and effect of an earthquake, according to Michigan Technological University :

• Below 2.5: Generally not felt
• 2.5 to 5.4: Minor or no damage
• 5.5 to 6.0: Slight damage to buildings
• 6.1 to 6.9: Serious damage
• 8.0 or greater: Massive damage, can totally destroy communities

Intensity scales, measured in Roman numerals, are used to describe how strong the earthquake felt to people in the area.

According to the California Earthquake Authority , an intensity of I is typically felt only under especially favorable conditions. A IV, which leads to light shaking, is felt indoors by many, but not typically outdoors. It might awaken some people at night and lead to a senation like a truck striking a building. A parked car would rock. Intensities VI and above would be strong, frightening and felt by all, with the damage increasing up to a X where the shaking would be violent. Some well-built wooden structures would be destroyed and most masonry and frame structures along with their foundations would be ruined.

While you might have heard the term " the Richter Scale " used to describe earthquakes, it is no longer commonly used because it was only valid for certain earthquake frequencies and distance ranges.

Why does an earthquake's depth matter?

Magnitude measures how strong a quake is. That said, how much the ground shakes depends on an earthquake's intensity, which in turn depends on two things: how far away the actual site of the temblor was and what kind of soil it occurs in.

This is why an earthquake's depth is often given. The epicenter of the Northridge earthquake in Los Angeles in 1994 was in the San Fernando Valley, the point where the quake was strongest. But the hypocenter , the location where the quake actually occurred, was more than 11 miles underground. If it had been closer to the surface the 6.7 magnitude quake would have been even more devastating.

The type of ground matters too. Bedrock shakes least, sand and gravel as much as two times more and mud and landfill as much as five times more, a major factor in why some areas of San Francisco suffered more than others in the Loma Prieta quake of 1989 .

Why real earthquakes aren't like in the movies

Though movies like San Andreas and Earthquake show enormous entire coastlines dropping off into the ocean, it's not going to happen.

According to the US Geological Service, while a "mega-quake with a magnitude of 10 or larger is theoretically possible, it's very unlikely .

The magnitude of an earthquake magnitude depends in part on how long the geological fault it occurs on is. Longer faults result in stronger earthquakes.

There are no known faults capable of generating a magnitude 10 or larger. The San Andreas fault of movie fame couldn't produce a quake larger than about 8.3 given its length, according to USGS.

The largest earthquake in US history was the 1964 Good Friday quake in Alaska , a 9.2 magnitude quake which killed 131 people. It lasted four and a half minutes and ran along the Aleutian fault.

What's the chance of an aftershock?

Any time there's an earthquake, one concern is that it was merely a foreshock to a bigger quake that's coming.

Globally, the probability one earthquake will be followed by a large earthquake within 3 days is somewhere just over 6%, according to USGS .

That means whenever there's an earthquake, there's about a 94% chance that it wasn't a foreshock and there won't be any more quakes linked to it.

The numbers are a little different for California, which is very seismically active. There, about half of the biggest earthquakes were preceded by foreshocks, according to USGS. But that means half were not.

Unfortunately, it's impossible to know if any one quake is a foreshock.

Aftershocks  are defined as smaller earthquakes that happen in days after a larger quake. As USGS puts it, they represent "minor readjustments along the portion of a fault that slipped at the time of the mainshock."

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Battle for the House: These Are the Races to Watch

Democrats are targeting incumbent Republicans in a number of districts President Biden won in 2020 — but the general rule is, as goes the presidential race, so go House races.

By Jonathan Weisman

Control of the U.S. House of Representatives, at this point in the election cycle, is anybody’s guess.

Right now, the House is divided by just one or two votes, with Republicans clinging to the slimmest of majorities. The Democratic Party is similarly fighting to keep control of the Senate , where it has a one-seat majority.

At first glance, it may appear that House Democrats have the better chance of seizing the majority in 2025 than Republicans do. Republicans occupy 17 districts won by President Biden in 2020, while Democrats hold just five districts won by former President Donald J. Trump.

But the general rule is, as goes the presidential race, so go House races, because partisanship and turnout can hold more sway than personal knowledge of the candidates. Here are the types of races to watch that could decide control of the House.

Incumbent Republicans in districts won by Biden: Reliably blue states

California is a key battleground in the fight for the House majority in 2024. Even if the presidential race is not competitive, the race for an open Senate seat could juice turnout. Here, Democrats see a number of prime pickup opportunities in the form of Republicans who hold seats in districts that Mr. Biden swept, in some cases by double digits, in the last presidential election. However, some of these same districts swung toward Republicans in the 2022 midterms, illustrating the tossup nature of many of these areas.

Greater New York is the other battlefield that will determine House control. Again, the presidential race may not be competitive, and in 2022, Republicans proved better at mobilizing voters than Democrats did. But newly redrawn districts shifted some seats slightly toward Democrats, especially the 22nd.

California’s 27th District

Republican Mike Garcia vs. Democrat George Whitesides

Biden +12 in 2020

Republican +6 in 2022

Mr. Garcia has become the ultimate escape artist against Democrats in this district across northern Los Angeles County. He won the seat in a special election in May 2020 against Christy Smith, a Democrat and a former one-term state assemblywoman, after another Democrat, Katie Hill, resigned after a sex scandal. He beat Ms. Smith again that November, by 333 votes, and then beat her a third time in 2022 by a more comfortable margin, even though redistricting had lopped off part of his stronghold in Simi Valley. This time around, he will have to best a very different Democrat, Mr. Whitesides, an aerospace engineer and business executive, in a presidential election year.

California’s 13th District

Republican John Duarte vs. Democrat Adam Gray

Republican +0.4 in 2022

California’s 22nd District

Republican David Valadao vs. Democrat Rudy Salas

Republican +3 in 2022

California’s 45th District

Republican Michelle Steel vs. Democrat Derek Tran

Republican +5 in 2022

California’s 40th District

Republican Young Kim vs. Democrat Joe Kerr

Republican +14 in 2022

New York’s 1st District

Republican Nick LaLota vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 25

Republican +11 in 2022

Of all the hot races in greater New York, the one considered just out of the Democrats’ reach is on Long Island, but John Avlon, a former on-air personality at CNN, is hoping to put this sleeper race on the map.

New York’s 22nd District

Republican Brandon Williams vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 25

Republican +1 in 2022

New York’s 4th District

Republican Anthony D’Esposito vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 25

Republican +4 in 2022

New York’s 17th District

Republican Mike Lawler vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 25

Republican +0.6 in 2022

New York’s 19th District

Republican Marc Molinaro vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 25

Republican +1.6 in 2022

New Jersey’s 7th District

Republican Tom Kean Jr. vs. Democrat Susan Altman

Oregon’s 5th District

Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on May 21

Republican +2 in 2022

Democratic voters in 2022 sided with a progressive insurgent, Jamie McLeod-Skinner, over the seven-term moderate incumbent, Kurt Schrader, in the Democratic primary, only to see her lose to a Republican in the general election — one of the very few seats to flip Republican in the midterms.

Democrats in Washington are trying to prevent a repeat disappointment, backing a veteran legislator, Janelle Bynum, but Ms. McLeod-Skinner is still in the running. The winner of that matchup will compete against the Republican incumbent, Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, who does not have Republican opposition in her primary.

Incumbent Republicans in districts won by Biden: Swingy western districts and presidential battlegrounds

A handful of other Biden districts in the West and elsewhere around the country are currently represented by Republicans — making for more ripe targets. In some cases, Mr. Biden won these areas only narrowly in 2020.

Arizona’s 1st District

Republican David Schweikert vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on July 30

Republican +0.9 in 2022

Arizona’s 6th District

Republican Juan Ciscomani vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on July 30

Republican +1.5 in 2022

Nebraska’s 2nd District

The winner of the Republican primary on May 14 vs. Democrat Tony Vargas

Representative Don Bacon, a Republican and the incumbent, is a perennial Democratic target in this swing district around Omaha. Mr. Vargas, a state senator, came within 2.6 percentage points in 2022, and is running unopposed in the Democratic primary. This time, Mr. Bacon’s fight to keep his seat is complicated by a challenger to his right in the Republican primary, which will be held on May 14. Dan Frei has the endorsement of the state Republican Party, and could upend years of Mr. Bacon’s carefully cultivated image as a moderate conciliator as he battles to appeal to the G.O.P. base. When Mr. Biden won this district in 2020, he was awarded one Electoral College vote, despite Mr. Trump’s winning the rest of the state. That’s because Nebraska allocates its electoral votes by congressional district, rather than through a “winner take all” system.

Pennsylvania’s 1st District

Republican Brian Fitzpatrick vs. Democrat Ashley Ehasz

Republican +10 in 2022

Republican Jen Kiggans vs. the winner of the Democratic primary on June 18

Incumbent Democrats in districts won by Trump: All over the map

The five Trump districts held by House Democrats stretch from Alaska to Maine, following no geographic pattern. They are all top targets as Republicans try to expand their majority.

Ohio’s 9th District

Democrat Marcy Kaptur vs. Republican Derek Merrin

Democrat +13 in 2022

Ms. Kaptur is a survivor, the longest-serving female member of Congress who achieved that milestone this year only by winning re-election in 2022 in a district purposely drawn by Republicans to beat her. That feat proved easier than expected, in large part because Republicans nominated J.R. Majewski, an inexperienced Trump acolyte most known for padding his military résumé and turning his lawn into a giant mural of the former president. This time, Republicans pressured Mr. Majewski out of the race and nominated a youthful committee chairman from the Ohio House who began his political career at 19 on the Waterville City Council, outside Toledo. He was mayor at 21.

Maine’s 2nd District

Democrat Jared Golden vs. the winner of the Republican primary on June 11

Democrat +6 in 2022

Pennsylvania’s 8th District

Democrat Matt Cartwright vs. Republican Rob Bresnahan Jr.

Democrat +2 in 2022

Washington’s 3rd District

The top two finishers from the nonpartisan primary on Aug. 6, which pits Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a freshman Democrat, against three Republicans and a Democrat

Democrat +0.8 in 2022

Alaska’s at-large congressional district

The top two finishers from a nonpartisan primary on Aug. 20, which pits Mary Peltola, the incumbent and a Democrat, against two Republicans, will go on to compete in the general election

Democrat +10 in 2022

Open seats and freshman Democrats: Tough terrain

North carolina’s 1st district.

Incumbent Democrat Don Davis vs. Republican Laurie Buckhout

Democrat +5 in 2022

The Republican gerrymandering of North Carolina House districts was a huge setback for Democrats, taking an evenly split, seven-to-seven House delegation in a closely divided state and locking in 10 Republican seats. Just one competitive district is left, and Mr. Davis will have to defend it against Washington Republicans’ chosen candidate, a retired Army colonel with a Bronze Star.

Incumbent Democrat Yadira Caraveo vs. the winner of the Republican primary on June 25

Democrat +0.7 in 2022

Michigan 7th District

Open Democratic seat, Democrat Curtis Hertel vs. Republican Tom Barrett

Michigan’s 8th District

Open Democratic seat that will pit the winners of the Democratic and Republican primaries on Aug. 6 against each other

New Mexico’s 2nd District

Incumbent Democrat Gabriel Vasquez vs. Republican Yvette Herrell

Ohio’s 13th District

Incumbent Democrat Emilia Sykes vs. Republican Kevin Coughlin

Pennsylvania’s 7th District

Incumbent Democrat Susan Wild vs. the winner of the Republican primary on April 23

A change in the overall political mood could move some of these races into tossup territory. Here are a few to keep an eye on:

Virginia’s 7th District

The decision of Representative Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat, to run for governor turns her Democratic-leaning seat into a free-for-all. Seven Democrats have declared for the primary on June 18, including Eugene Vindman, the twin brother of Alexander Vindman, the military officer on the National Security Council who blew the whistle on Mr. Trump’s efforts to press Ukraine’s leader into announcing an investigation of Mr. Biden. Eight Republicans are running.

Nevada’s 3rd District

Nevada’s three Democratic House members proved their resilience in 2022 when all were re-elected in a year when Republicans recaptured the state’s governorship. In 2024, the state is a presidential and Senate battleground. Representative Susie Lee may have the toughest district to defend against the winner of the Republican primary on June 11.

Democrat +4 in 2022

Pennsylvania’s 10th District

Representative Scott Perry, a Republican leader of the House Freedom Caucus, has never moderated his conservative politics to match his swing district, even after the committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol excoriated him for his role in trying to overturn the election. This year, a well-known personality, the Pennsylvania newscaster Janelle Stelson, has chosen to run as a Democrat and raise Jan. 6 as her main cause. First, she needs to get through the primary on April 23.

Republican +8 in 2022

Colorado’s 3rd District

In 2022, Adam Frisch, a Democrat, startled many people, including his opponent, Representative Lauren Boebert, when he came within 546 votes of defeating her. He was seeking a rematch in this vast district that stretches from the western slopes of the Rockies through most of southern Colorado, but Ms. Boebert, a conservative firebrand with a flare for grabbing attention, bowed out and moved to run in a district in the eastern part of the state. Prevailing this time against the winner of the 10-candidate Republican primary on June 25 will be even harder for Mr. Frisch. But from his days as Ms. Boebert’s nemesis, he has raised a staggering $10.8 million.

Republican +0.2 in 2022

New York’s 3rd District

George Santos put this Long Island district on the map with his fraudulent résumé, congressional histrionics and remarkable ouster from the House. A solid victory by Tom Suozzi, a Democrat, in a special election to replace Mr. Santos has convinced many handicappers that the seat will remain in his hands this November. But Republicans won it in 2022 with Mr. Santos, and eight of them have lined up ahead of the primary on June 25 to try to take it back.

Biden +11.3

Jonathan Weisman is a politics writer, covering campaigns with an emphasis on economic and labor policy. He is based in Chicago. More about Jonathan Weisman

House prices continue to rise as number of landlords increase

While buying a home to live in remains out of reach for many Australians, investors are flooding back into the housing market.

Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows lending to investors — otherwise known as landlords — has jumped almost 20 per cent in the past year.

Almost four in 10 people taking out a mortgage now are landlords.

The combination of rising house prices, rising population growth (due to migration), rising rental demand and slower housing construction has made housing investment a more attractive proposition, according to economist Rachel ViforJ.

"If we've got huge demand relative to supply that would normally push up rents. And that would be an incentive for investors to invest in rental housing," Professor ViforJ told the ABC.

The ABC visited an open house last week hosted by Adelaide real estate agent Aditya Singh.

Mr Singh said he had noticed an uptick in investors buying to rent or short-term lease (like Airbnb) had increased over the past year.

"At the last two months of open houses, we've had lots of investors," he said.

Meanwhile, housing data from CoreLogic shows prices in capital cities continue to rise — up 0.6 per cent in March and up 10.2 per cent since January of 2023 when prices began to rise again after a short slump.

CoreLogic's Tim Lawless said there had been 14-months of consistent growth.

"Despite very high interest rates and a cost of living crisis, we've been seeing housing values rising ever since, albeit at a slower rate of growth," Mr Lawless said.

In practical terms that means a house valued at $800,000 in January 2023 that increased by 10.2 per cent would now be worth $881,600.

All the while rents have continued to climb, largely due to those low vacancy rates which are the result of a post-COVID boost in migration over the past year.

Mr Lawless suggested the increase in investors could potentially help to ease the rental crisis.

"Arguably more investment in the marketplace is a positive thing. Hopefully that is introducing more rental stock to the marketplace."

Though he noted: "Obviously, if investors are purchasing established stock off other investors, it doesn't necessarily add to overall rental stock."

Rachel ViforJ, a professor of economics at Curtin University is more blunt: the state of housing affordability is a "really, really massive problem … whether you're looking at the homeownership market or you're looking at the rental market".

"If a young person is looking to buy today, that young person will be facing much higher house prices than say 10 or 20 years ago and also facing much higher interest rates than several years ago," she said.

"The median house price in Sydney is now well over $1 million, and unfortunately, people's income levels are just not keeping up with house price growth."

The cause is widely agreed to be one of supply and demand.

"On the supply side, we've had historically low levels of building approvals and so we've also had labour market shortages as well in the construction industry," Professor ViforJ said.

"And on the other hand, we've actually got huge demand for housing, in the form of a large number of migrants who have come in over the last year."

Tension between generations becomes an unintended consequence

The housing affordability crisis is having unintended consequences between generations, Professor ViforJ said.

"There's definitely growing intergenerational tension in the housing market.

"Most people who are home owners are older and many of them would have bought back in say the 1980s, or the 1990s, just before the worldwide housing boom."

"If you bought just before the housing boom, then you would be enjoying a huge amount of capital gain," said Professor ViforJ.

"Unfortunately, what that means is that it's actually locking out growing numbers of young people from being able to access first home ownership."

The divide was not just between generations but between classes, she said.

"if you're a young person, but you have access to the bank of mum and dad, you'll actually find it easier to be able to buy your first home"

That was the case for 25-year-old bartender Connor Roche-West who just purchased his first apartment in Sydney's lower north shore this past weekend.

Mr Roche-West was thrilled when he spoke to the ABC after the auction.

He said it had been a long hard journey to buy a property in the current market where he was often outbid by other buyers, some of whom he believed may have been investors.

"It's rough knowing it's going to be back on the market in a couple of weeks for renting, but it is what it is, there's not much you can do" he said.

He said he was able to purchase the apartment with some financial help from his parents which he said he was very grateful for.

The unfortunate reality was that it was "damn near impossible" for young people like him to get into the housing market without such monetary support, Mr Roche-West said.

'I think most politicians will be quite cautious'

Real estate agent Ajay Valanju who sold the apartment to Mr Roche-West said he had noticed an increase of investors since the start of this year.

"Last year it was mainly owner-occupiers who were active but now we're seeing investors coming back into the marketplace."

The tension at some auctions between different bidders is sometimes palpable.

"It's definitely the case that when you have large numbers of investors wanting to purchase properties, as well as large numbers of first home buyers wanting to purchase properties, that there will be intense competition for the limited supply of housing that's in the market," Professor ViforJ said.

"And of course, with rental investors, typically, they're on higher incomes than first home buyers, typically they have more equity behind them, and therefore more financially well off."

Aside from the generational divide referenced by Professor ViforJ, the other reason property investors can be an uncomfortable topic when it comes to housing affordability is that they often can price out younger buyers because of tax incentives.

One of those tax incentives is negative gearing, which essentially means any losses a housing investor makes on the shortfall between rent and interest will be offset against other income — and covered by the taxpayer.

Although touching negative gearing was not very politically palatable, Mr Lawless said there were some ways to scale it back if any politician is game to try.

"Speaking from a more personal perspective, I think there is room to change negative gearing policies, perhaps capping it at two properties or less than three properties, or capping the total amount that you can negative gear will be much more palatable to voters."

Mr Lawless said this may help to reduce the number of investors who have "a significant stable of investment properties that have treated it much more like an investment class than the housing asset itself."

Another possible tax reform would be adjusting capital gains tax concessions which allows investors who hold a property for more than two years to get a 50 per cent concession on that tax when they sell it. Removing that might disincentivise investment in the property market, Tim Lawless said.

Though like negative gearing, tinkering with capital gains tax hasn't proven a very popular political pursuit.

"The Labor government did have a policy of changing negative gearing policies and capital gains tax concessions, and they seemed to lose from an unlosable position. So I think most politicians will be quite cautious in adjusting these types of policies," Mr Lawless said.

Professor ViforJ said another approach could be winding back stamp duty, which is the tax someone pays when they purchase a house.

Instead, she proposed replacing it with something like an annual land tax "that is not an up-front cost that people have to pay upon purchase, but it's an annual tax that they actually pay on the value of the land year after year after year, but not in a lump sum."

Tax reform isn't the only option: experts

Aside from tax reform, the supply of housing clearly needed to be increased to meet demand, Professor ViforJ said, however that needed to include sufficient social housing.

"We do need to build new properties across the income and wealth distribution," she said.

"But we do need to make sure that we have a focus as well on people who are at the bottom end of the distribution, we're finding it difficult to access housing."

"The supply of social housing has not kept up with the demand for it over a very long period of time now, which means that we are actually getting larger numbers of people who are slipping into homelessness."

Professor ViforJ said there were many options on the table to improve housing affordability and the reality was many of them would need to be used together as there was no silver bullet solution.

Mr Lawless said other shorter-term solutions included government grants such as the boost to the first home owners grant after the global financial crisis, which led to a surge in house sales.

"But as soon as that stimulus was removed, we saw our first home buyer activity fall to below what it was pre stimulus. So I think that there's a really good argument here that those sort of policy initiatives, those stimulus levels don't really do a great deal for home ownership in the long run, and arguably pushes prices higher."

Instead, Mr Lawless believes the problem is best tackled by increasing housing supply.

As for the outlook for the year ahead, Mr Lawless believed the numbers are only going to go up.

"I think the outlook for the housing market is it probably is further growth through the rest of this year and into next year. And arguably, if we did see interest rates coming down later this year, that could add a little bit more exuberance to housing activity."

While Mr Lawless doesn't believe the number of housing investors will rise this year, Professor Viforj believes it might.

"I think that as long as the rental vacancy rates are remaining, so low below 1 per cent, we will continue to see the amount of housing investment rise over the coming year. And I think that would especially be the case if interest rates start to fall."

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Why Biden’s White House iftar unravelled amid Gaza war

Sources tell Al Jazeera the White House cancelled Ramadan meal after many Muslim invitees declined to attend.

Washington, DC – The White House has cancelled a Ramadan iftar meal after several Muslim Americans declined the invitation in protest of President Joe Biden’s support for Israel’s war on Gaza , according to two people familiar with the matter.

The sources, who spoke to Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity, said the cancellation on Tuesday came after Muslim community members warned leaders against attending the White House meal.

Keep reading

Israel ‘agreed’ to take us rafah concerns into consideration: white house, in washington, dc: celebrating ramadan, protesting israel’s siege of gaza, us doubles down on its defence of arming israel despite gaza atrocities.

Edward Ahmed Mitchell, the deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), also said the event was nixed because so many people chose not to attend, including invitees who had initially agreed to go.

“The American Muslim community said very early on that it would be completely unacceptable for us to break bread with the very same White House that is enabling the Israeli government to starve and slaughter the Palestinian people in Gaza,” Mitchell told Al Jazeera.

Both CNN and NPR had reported on Monday that the White House was preparing a small community iftar.

But hours later, on Tuesday, the White House announced instead that it would be hosting a meal for Muslim government staffers only and holding a separate meeting with a few Muslim American community figures.

The cancelled iftar underscores Biden’s struggle to stem growing anger in US Arab and Muslim communities over his unconditional support for Israel.

Critics warn the outrage could translate into peril for Biden at the ballot box during November’s presidential election.

‘We listened,’ White House says

Over the past two decades, US presidents have hosted iftars with dozens of prominent Muslim Americans. Mirroring other religious and cultural events at the White House, Ramadan meals have served as a celebration of the Muslim community and are traditionally open to the press.

White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre confirmed that Biden and his Vice President Kamala Harris will meet with Muslim “community leaders” on Tuesday.

Asked why the “community leaders” will not attend the iftar, Jean-Pierre said that they requested a meeting instead of a meal.

“They wanted to make sure that there was an opportunity to discuss the issues at hand,” she told reporters.

“They thought it would be important to do that. And so, we listened, we heard, and we adjusted the format to be responsive.”

Several Muslim American activists said the meeting will be another futile “photo-op”, arguing that the Muslim community has made its position known over the past six months.

“No matter how many meetings we have, no matter how many people have gone in, no matter how many conversations are being held, the White House has refused to change,” said Mohamad Habehh, the director of development at American Muslims for Palestine.

Habehh stressed that Biden cannot claim to care for the Muslim American community if he does not end his backing of Israel.

“These photo-ops that they’re doing — these discussions that they’re doing to somehow show they still have the Muslim community’s support — are just pathetic attempts to make themselves look good at a time where their true colours have been seen,” Habehh told Al Jazeera.

The Biden administration has held several off-the-record meetings with some Arabs and Muslims across the country since the start of the war in Gaza.

‘Selected by the White House’

A key issue with such talks, activists say, is that the administration has been handpicking whom to meet with.

A Muslim advocate close to the administration presented a list of credible Palestinian American leaders to invite for a meeting at the White House last year, but the government rejected the suggested individuals, one source told Al Jazeera.

Emgage, a Muslim political advocacy group that endorsed Biden in 2020, said it received an invitation to Tuesday’s meeting but declined to attend, citing the US’s unconditional support for Israel and the mounting death toll in Gaza.

“In this moment of tremendous pain and suffering, we have asked the White House to postpone this gathering and to convene a proper policy meeting with representatives of the community’s choosing, rather than those selected by the White House,” Emgage CEO Wa’el Alzayat said in a statement.

Emgage outlined a list of demands for Biden, including an “immediate and permanent” ceasefire, the resumption of funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and a “legitimate political track” for a Palestinian state.

“Emgage is ready to support efforts that engage in a substantive manner on the above priorities. However, without more Palestinian voices and policy experts in the room, we do not believe today’s meeting will provide for such an opportunity,” Alzayat said.

Hebah Kassem, a Palestinian American political strategist, echoed that concern.

“The administration is strategically selecting who should be at the table, and they’re picking people who likely won’t be critical of their actions and policies,” Kassem told Al Jazeera.

“Why are we allowing them to choose who represents us? These meetings haven’t led to any change. If anything, Biden has doubled down his support for Israel and increased the supply of weapons to Israel.”

US support for Israel

The Biden administration has ruled out conditioning or stopping the flow of weapons to Israel despite mounting Israeli atrocities.

The Israeli offensive has killed close to 33,000 Palestinians, destroyed large parts of Gaza and pushed the territory to the verge of famine .

While the Biden administration has occasionally expressed concern about the actions of the Israeli government, it has regularly asserted its commitment to the alliance with Israel.

On Tuesday, for example, the White House expressed outrage over the Israeli attack that killed seven World Central Kitchen humanitarian workers.

Still, White House National Security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that the US will not hold a “sort of condition over their [Israel’s] neck”.

“We’re still going to make sure that they can defend themselves,” he said.

Abed Ayoub, the executive director of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), said Biden’s unwavering support for Israel shows that meetings with administration officials over Gaza have not worked.

“You’ve got to measure the effectiveness of these meetings through results and actions by the administration,” he told Al Jazeera. “The administration knows where we stand; they don’t need to hear it again.”

But Salima Suswell, the leader of the Black Muslim Leadership Council, said it is important for Biden to hear the perspective of Muslim Americans directly. She was attending Tuesday’s meeting at the White House.

“The President needs to understand that Black Muslims and Black Americans are devastated by the ongoing tragedy in Gaza, the loss of so many lives, and the Administration’s support of the onslaught,” Suswell told Al Jazeera in an email before the meeting.

“The President has an election coming up, and Black voters and Muslims will be pivotal. I want to make clear to him what is at stake should he not take action.”

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Legislation considered under suspension of the rules of the house of representatives during the week of april 8, 2024.

The Majority Leader of the House of Representatives announces bills that will be considered under suspension of the rules in that chamber. CBO estimates the effects of those bills on direct spending and revenues.

The Majority Leader of the House of Representatives announces bills that will be considered under suspension of the rules in that chamber. Under suspension, floor debate is limited, all floor amendments are prohibited, points of order against the bill are waived, and final passage requires a two-thirds majority vote.

At the request of the Majority Leader and the House Committee on the Budget, CBO estimates the effects of those bills on direct spending and revenues. CBO has limited time to review the legislation before consideration. Although it is possible in most cases to determine whether the legislation would affect direct spending or revenues, time may be insufficient to estimate the magnitude of those effects. If CBO has prepared estimates for similar or identical legislation, a more detailed assessment of budgetary effects, including effects on spending subject to appropriation, may be included.

CBO’s estimates of the bills that have been posted for possible consideration under suspension of the rules during the week of April 8, 2024, include:

• H.R. 524, To amend the Coastal Barrier Resources Act to create an exemption for certain shoreline borrow sites, as amended
• H.R. 929, Puyallup Tribe of Indians Land Into Trust Confirmation Act of 2023 
• H.R. 1246, To authorize leases of up to 99 years for land held in trust for federally recognized Indian Tribes
• H.R.1792, South Pacific Tuna Treaty Act of 2023, as amended 
• H.R. 1829, To require the Secretary of Agriculture to convey the Pleasant Valley Ranger District Administrative Site to Gila County, Arizona, as amended
• H.R. 2560, Sea Turtle Rescue Assistance Act of 2023, as amended 
• H.R. 3250, National Museum of Play Recognition Act 
• H.R. 4389, Migratory Birds of the Americas Conservation Enhancements Act of 2023, as amended
• H.R. 6011, ROWATA Act, as amended 
• H.R. 6233, Community Reclamation Partnerships Act 
• H.R. 6443, Jamul Indian Village Land Transfer Act 
• H.R. 6492, EXPLORE Act, as amended
• H.R. 6655, A Stronger Workforce for America Act, as amended 
• S. 2051, Missing Children's Assistance Reauthorization Act of 2023, as amended