AUCKLAND STREETS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13494, 22 May 1907, Page 8

AUCKLAND STREETS.

THEIR NAMES AND THEIR 'NUMBERS. HOW TO CONFUSE THE STRANGER. Fcosi time to time Auckland City is made the subject of criticism of transient persons, whose opinions are as varied as they are freely expressed. Some say it is the dirtiest city they" have ever seen; others, on the contrary, remark that of all the cities they know Auckland is the cleanest. Some compare it with the three other principal cities of the colony, favourably or unfavourably, as the case may be, and others measure it with Sydney, Melbourne, or Adelaide. Some find . our streets mean and dingy; others compare Queen-street with some of the finest main thoroughfares in Europe. Residents who have been elsewhere have their own opinions, but those whose experience <of urge cities is limited to those of the colony are.less able to make up their minds in view of the diverse criticisms. : HAPHAZARD NOMENCLATURE. It is not only the stranger, but also the permanent resident that has good grounds for complaint of the haphazard way in which the streets have been named, of the steady hostility which the local authorities have shown to numbering the houses, and of the description of the streets. In the case of the city our shortcomings in this respect will soon be things of the past. The shops, and houses have been numbered, and the streets named, the names being visible by day aud by night on the lamp-posts at the street corners, for the city has seen the error of its ways; but in this matter the other local bodies remain steeped in their, sins. The.-gentlemen who form the/local governing bodies are. not alone to blame,' for they know that they have to deal riot only with considerable prejudice, but also with much unreasonable and unreasoning stupidity; but they certainly have some-" thing to answer for, if not to the present', generation, then to posterity. Still great« loss of time and unnecessary trouble, entirely avoidable, are, to be attributed ■/tothe need for a careful and .more general consideration of ' : the' important, matter of'.'•; the naming and numbering of streets.'. AN UNIMPEACHABLE AUTHORITY,; However, it is x good, practice to support a statement by reference to some accredited authority, ; and .while admitting, that''the Post Office Directory does not provide much : exhilarating reading matter,* it is at least an : instructive and interesting work upon the question • at. issue. ; ',' For instance, it shows that nearly every famous London street has its namesake in /Auckland. There are Chancery Lane, • Brixton Road, Cheapside,* Jermyn-street, Bondstreet,' Fleet-street, Carleton Gore Road, Parliament-street, the Strand, 1 ; City Road, and Liverpool-street. Such.names, if sententious, are not descriptive; but they have, the merit of being distinctive, and are easy to. remember; moreover, they do not appear; to be. duplicated and most of them belong to streets in the city ..of Auckland itself.;; Edinburgh is remembered in Princesstreet and Dublin in Sackville-street, and almost every English town,- '-great and small, is recalled by High-street, which, in the case of this, city, is a back street and not part of a.main road, although it was originally laid out as the principal thorbughfare of Auckland. The -. memory of prominent men in New Zealand's history is perpetuated in Greystreet, Jervois Road and Ranfurly Avenue ; but we -have no Seddon-street, nor even a Ward-street, a Fowlds-street, or Hall* Jones-street. / The Church is .better;' off,. Jo*, there are several, thoroughfares with, the' name of Selwyn attached 'to them;*;- and': Pompallier - Terrace recalls the first Rom&' Catholic Bishop of Auckland. -Even t'ici memory of St. 'Francis do- Sales .'/» kfepV green by the; street of that name, $atf%(| Patrick has been -neglected, although :v John is - remembered by a volcanic cone, and St.- Paui has been utilised' in prefer- ■' ence to Abercrombie, the name once borne by a city street. The name of Rolleston superseded; that >of Antigua in Christchurch; but 1 Rdlleston is not remembered by Auckland streets: neither are Fox. Stafford, ; Vogel, nor Atkinson and - yet the names of Salisbury, Disraeli, Gladstone; and Chamberlain have been borrowed for local streets. Several land agents and owners of estates that haver been cut up into small sections have kindly given their ' names to new streets on properties in which they have evidently had a sentimental,. as well aaya pecuniary interest; but "here the terms employed, if they have been i descriptive, nave not always been sententious. : DUPLICATION OF NAMES. • T]l there are a large number of cases in wmoh - the same name has , been adopted for two, three,, and four streets, and some of them m practically the same locality. Ihe directory shows for Auckland and suburbs three Sussex, streets, two Charlotte streets, three Suriimer streets, .four Stanley streets, three Queen streets, four Chamberlain s Avenues or- streets, two Rose roads,, four. Russell streets, four Cameron streets, two Avon streets,' five King streets, two Commercial roads, two Lawrence '* streets, two; Brown streets, two Prospect Terraces, three John streets, three Grey streets, two George streets, two Greenwood streets,' two Exmouth streets, three Edwin streets, three Clyde streets, . two East streets, two James streets, three Eden streets, one Eden Crescent, one Eden , Terrace, - one Eden Vale Road,' and one Eden Dale Road, all more or less widely separated. .Again we have two Cracroft streets, two Devon streets, a Darby and a Derby street, two Domain roads, three Domain streets, a Domain Valley, and a Domain Drive. There are Hobson-street, Hobson Park Road, Hobson Bay Road, and Hobson Place; a Gladstone-street at Newton and Gladstone Road at Parnell; an Arney Crescent and Arney Road at Remuera, and an Arney-street at Newton; a Victoria Avenue at Remuera, another in Eden Terrace, and another at Mount Eden, an Alexandra-street in the city and an Alex-ander-street at ' Kingsland; Alma Place is in Parnell, but Alma-street is. at Newmarket there are Albert Avenue, Mount Eden ; Albert Road, Epsom; and Albert-street, city. -"■■•- -v In the Borough of Grey Lynn the memories of ; jurists, painters, poets, and statesmen are perpetuated in Disraeli, Priiiceps (Val Prinsep?), Browning, Millais, Coleridge, Cockburn, Jessel, Tennyson, Chamberlain, Elgin, Selborne, Leighton,. Salisbury, Harcourt, and Northcote streets. On the other hand there are names less known to fame, such as Warnock, Pollen, Murdoch, Firth, and Williamson.

POSTAL CLAIRVOYANCY. '. How the letter sorters manage whtn they handle a letter addressed to "John Doe " or "Richard Roe," Edwin-street, Auckland, passes the understanding of ordinary people. The wonder is, not that letters insufficiently addressed are sometimes delayed in delivery, but that they ever reach the addressees at all. Notwithstanding ' that all houses and shops in Auckland are, now numbered, correspondents have not yet been taught to utilise this description. : The postmen seem to know by some mysterious kind of clairvoyancy, where people live. Of course, it is their business to find out, but it is equally the duty of the public generally, and the local authorities in particular, to assist the Post Office in this important matter. How much delay is attributable to vague or insufficient addresses it is difficult for one outside the Post Office to estimate. The postmen are certainly very ingenious in this respect, as the following instance proves. A portrait of a small boy had been sent to an address in England, and when it reached there the addressee had gone and left no address. Endeavours were made to find him by the English Post Office, but without success. The portrait was returned to Auckland and opened. There was no address inside to indicate by whom it was tent, but the picture was passed along to the postmen, and was recognised by one of them as of a boy living on his round. It was duly returned to the original sender. But better things than this have been done in the Post Office; nevertheless the officials there have no time to , devote to solving enigmas.