Strawberry Park Towns | U/C

[panamaniac]

Two things.  First, the "optimistic" sidewalk goes out to River Road, as it always has.  Second, what makes you think that the numbers shown on the townhouses are street addresses?  With increments of one, this seems to me to be unlikely to be street addresses, although I don't know.  Will each home have its own street address, or will the development have a single address with each unit having a unit number?

[tomh009]

I would expect a single street address, with unit numbers. And the unit numbering is 100% up to the developer, the city has no say on that.

[panamaniac]

I would expect a single street address, with unit numbers. And the unit numbering is 100% up to the developer, the city has no say on that.

Indeed.  And in that case the units could well be numbered consecutively, as shown.  In that case, I could see some directional signs in their future (we have them in my development here in Ottawa, although we all have out own street addresses).

[ijmorlan]

Two things.  First, the "optimistic" sidewalk goes out to River Road, as it always has.  Second, what makes you think that the numbers shown on the townhouses are street addresses?  With increments of one, this seems to me to be unlikely to be street addresses, although I don't know.  Will each home have its own street address, or will the development have a single address with each unit having a unit number?

That is related to my point. I assume those to be unit numbers, with the whole thing at 150 (or whatever) Rosemount Dr.

But I think it would be better if they had 3-4 separate names for different parts of the driveway system, and gave the individual units numbers directly on those named streets (or avenues or whatever). I suspect this goes to City policy however and might not be something the developer could easily fix.

I didn’t even look at the actual specific layout of the numbers, which I agree with the other poster is very questionable. This part could (presumably) have been done with more care by the developer.

[KevinL]

I've never seen a complex like this give names to the interior roads; the postal system and emergency response, to name just two exampes, would not be able to use them as they are not registered in an official manner with the municipality.

[danbrotherston]

I've never seen a complex like this give names to the interior roads; the postal system and emergency response, to name just two exampes, would not be able to use them as they are not registered in an official manner with the municipality.

In fact, virtually nothing would work with them, Google Maps wouldn't have that data either, you would just have to "know" that Cherry Ln. is a private road.

These kind of things can be named internally if the residents want---and I have seen this, albeit not in this country, but the units *must also* be numbered.

[ijmorlan]

I've never seen a complex like this give names to the interior roads; the postal system and emergency response, to name just two exampes, would not be able to use them as they are not registered in an official manner with the municipality.

In fact, virtually nothing would work with them, Google Maps wouldn't have that data either, you would just have to "know" that Cherry Ln. is a private road.

These kind of things can be named internally if the residents want---and I have seen this, albeit not in this country, but the units *must also* be numbered.

That’s what I’m saying. They should be officially named and street numbered on the City maps.

If this “doesn’t work” with our current systems because they are private roads, then that is a problem with our current systems, because ownership shouldn’t affect the ability to officially record the names and get them into mapping databases.

[danbrotherston]

In fact, virtually nothing would work with them, Google Maps wouldn't have that data either, you would just have to "know" that Cherry Ln. is a private road.

These kind of things can be named internally if the residents want---and I have seen this, albeit not in this country, but the units *must also* be numbered.

That’s what I’m saying. They should be officially named and street numbered on the City maps.

If this “doesn’t work” with our current systems because they are private roads, then that is a problem with our current systems, because ownership shouldn’t affect the ability to officially record the names and get them into mapping databases.

I guess that is one position.  I don’t see the issue with unit numbering though.

[panamaniac]

My place in Ottawa is in a development of “privates” linked at five points to city streets. My specific private was originally a city street, with the result that we have to the door mail delivery and municipal garbage collection. We all have individual street addresses, although every unit was assigned a unit number in a lettered “block” (of townhouses).

[ijmorlan]

That’s what I’m saying. They should be officially named and street numbered on the City maps.

If this “doesn’t work” with our current systems because they are private roads, then that is a problem with our current systems, because ownership shouldn’t affect the ability to officially record the names and get them into mapping databases.

I guess that is one position.  I don’t see the issue with unit numbering though.

They don’t help with navigation. With normal numbering, they start somewhere and go up until they reach somewhere else, with odd on one side and even on the other. These ones just zigzag back and forth through the complex in a way that has no relation to how one would travel to reach one of them. By naming the pieces one can have more reasonable directions.

[danbrotherston]

I guess that is one position.  I don’t see the issue with unit numbering though.

They don’t help with navigation. With normal numbering, they start somewhere and go up until they reach somewhere else, with odd on one side and even on the other. These ones just zigzag back and forth through the complex in a way that has no relation to how one would travel to reach one of them. By naming the pieces one can have more reasonable directions.

Naming won't help with navigation either, what you need is signage. And given that it's an enclosed area, I don't see navigation as the main point, so much as you need identification.

Again, I'm not saying that it couldn't be better, just that I don't really see the need for what you are discussing.

[Nextasy]

They don’t help with navigation. With normal numbering, they start somewhere and go up until they reach somewhere else, with odd on one side and even on the other. These ones just zigzag back and forth through the complex in a way that has no relation to how one would travel to reach one of them. By naming the pieces one can have more reasonable directions.

Naming won't help with navigation either, what you need is signage. And given that it's an enclosed area, I don't see navigation as the main point, so much as you need identification.

Again, I'm not saying that it couldn't be better, just that I don't really see the need for what you are discussing.

I have an unnatural hatred for bad numbering systems. It would have only taken 5-10 minutes on a multi-million dollar project to come up with good design, but they couldn't be bothered. All it would take really would be to start counting at the entrance to the site, rather than an arbitrary point in the top left corner. And, more annoyingly, this is the sort of thing that can more or less be expected to never, ever, be fixed, because once they're sold, it's pretty a massive inconvenience to disrupt everybody like that.

I would have also preferred real street names in the development, I'm not sure why they could do that at Victoria Commons, but not here.

In the grand scheme its not a big deal, but a buildup of minor annoyances does stack together. It's more annoying that it would have taken pretty much nothing to do this right, but they couldn't be bothered, even though they're making millions off of this. I guess that's really what bugs me.

[danbrotherston]

Naming won't help with navigation either, what you need is signage. And given that it's an enclosed area, I don't see navigation as the main point, so much as you need identification.

Again, I'm not saying that it couldn't be better, just that I don't really see the need for what you are discussing.

I have an unnatural hatred for bad numbering systems. It would have only taken 5-10 minutes on a multi-million dollar project to come up with good design, but they couldn't be bothered. All it would take really would be to start counting at the entrance to the site, rather than an arbitrary point in the top left corner. And, more annoyingly, this is the sort of thing that can more or less be expected to never, ever, be fixed, because once they're sold, it's pretty a massive inconvenience to disrupt everybody like that.

I would have also preferred real street names in the development, I'm not sure why they could do that at Victoria Commons, but not here.

In the grand scheme its not a big deal, but a buildup of minor annoyances does stack together. It's more annoying that it would have taken pretty much nothing to do this right, but they couldn't be bothered, even though they're making millions off of this. I guess that's really what bugs me.

I think its easy to say they should have come up with a better system, I think it's harder to say what system would be better. I'm sure in this forum we could come up with a 100 different options with no real evidence as to which is better.  Evaluating which is better is actually really really hard.

As for Victoria Commons, I don't believe they are private roads, as the townhomes there are freehold, AFAIK.

Edit: Apparently I'm wrong about this. The City's GIS data shows them as private roads:

   

Now there are a few things I'm not understanding here, I have no idea how private roads work, yet are included in the city map, or why other townhouse developments have not done this.

I also don't understand how these townhomes are managing their private roads, or who actually owns these private roads. Unless only the exterior facing townhomes are freehold, I would think some entity must own and maintain the road, and collect fees or dues from the surrounding owners in order to pay for that maintenance.

[jamincan]

I think they're typically setup as condominiums.

[danbrotherston]

I think they're typically setup as condominiums.

Freehold means they are not a condominium corporation.