# Building (house) numbering schemes in your contry



## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

What kind of numbering systems is mostly used in your country/city?

I realize in Europe, most commonly numbering follows a sequence of buildings, sometimes with off 24-C/1 when a building is subsequently reconstructed and divided. 

In North America, distance-based numbering is more common with things like 24.790 Old Oak Lake Drive. 

What about your city/country?


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## Chrissib (Feb 9, 2008)

In Germany it's the sequence of buildings that is used for numbering.

On one side of the street the numbers go like this: 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15...
And on the other side like this: 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16...

If a lot is divided (in this case number 4) it goes like this: 2 4a 4b 4c 6 ...

If some lots are unified (in this case 4, 6 and 8) it goes like this: 2 4-8 10 12 14...


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## Chicagoago (Dec 2, 2005)

In Chicago, where we have an almost perfect grid:

Every street is broken up into 50 addresses from one intersection to another, odd on one side, even on the other. Every two street sections creates one block. Every eight blocks creates exactly one mile. So for every mile you go in the city, the numbering system increases by 800. The addresses automatically change once you hit an intersection, it's not just counting in order all the way until a street finally ends like you'll see in Europe.

Since all the streets are in a grid, if you just kept counting you'd have the numbers not matching up on parallel streets once you got a few blocks from the start line because there are a different number of buildings on every street. So on one side you might see 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, then start with 50 after you cross an intersection instead of 12. I live at 4143, but then across the street it starts right at 4200 instead of 4145. It all has to be consistent from block to block. Sometimes a street might dead end and stop, but then start again 6 blocks north of there. Even if it's not actually there, the street name and addressing system will carry on until the street starts back up. So Racine might dead end at 3800 north, then two miles later the street picks back up and the addressing starts again at 5600. The addresses in the city run from around 7400 on the north to 13900 south, and 8000 west to maybe 4000 east.

The addresses all start at the intersection of State Street and Madison Street downtown. Everything radiates away from there with either "east", "west", "north", or "south" addresses. So you can have 1256 North and 1256 South, or 1256 West, etc.

The streets are also broken up with side streets, minor streets, major streets and arterial streets in a certain order.

So for the numbering system starting at 0:

*0: Artery*
50: side street
100: side street
150 side street
*200 minor street*
250 side street
300 side street
350 side street
*400 MAJOR street*
450 side street
500 side street
550 side street
*600 minor street*
650 side street
700 side street
750 side street
*800 MAJOR street*
.
.
*1000 minor street*
.
.
*1200 MAJOR street*
.
.
*1400 minor street*
.
.
*1600 ARTERY*

Then it repeats again.


So there are major streets every 1/2 mile, and every two miles you will have an artery instead of just a major street. It's basically all about how many lanes they have, and how they're set up to have more traffic capacity.

The transit system generally has a bus running on every main/artery streets. So there is a bus route every 1/2 mile going east-west and north-south. Train lines also tend to have a stop every 1/2 mile at main/artery streets to connect with the buses.

It's very easy once you get use to it. People will explain where they live or where they're going with numbers much of the time instead of just throwing out street names. I know if someone lives at 6400 North, they are 8 miles north of the dividing line downtown. If they're at 4800 North and 1600 West, then they're 6 miles north of downtown and 2 miles west. When I lived in Logan Square and people asked where I was when I'd go by the lake to hang out, they'd always say "holy shit - way out there??" when I'd say that I lived at 3200 west.

My world tends to be from 1600 west to the lake on the east, and from 4400 north to 1200 south.


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## Spookvlieger (Jul 10, 2009)

Chrissib said:


> In Germany it's the sequence of buildings that is used for numbering.
> 
> On one side of the street the numbers go like this: 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15...
> And on the other street like this: 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16...
> ...


Same for Belgium. But you'll ofthen find it differend practice because of our bad spatial planning. It must be a real headache for mail delivering companies.


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## mhays (Sep 12, 2002)

The US doesn't use distance. It uses sequence everywhere I've seen. But the sequence is tied to street numbers. Whether the street is "6th" or "Elm", it'll start with 600 and the next block is probably 700. Even numbers are generally, but not always, on the west and north sides. 

Tokyo is a disaster. The address will get you to the correct few blocks, then you have to find the non-sequential building number somewhere in those blocks. I learned this while looking for my very small, barely-signed hotel once...


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## Cicerón (May 15, 2006)

In Spain is almost the same as in Germany (or any other European country I guess).

Odd numbers on the left side of the street, even numbers on the right side (looking to the direction where the numbers grow), following a correlative sequence.

If a building occupying number 4 is later divided, we use 4, 4 bis, 4 ter, 4 quater...


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## earthJoker (Dec 15, 2004)

Switzerland is similar to Germany: Most of the time all numbers are used, unless there is a big difference between the number of buildings on one side of the road an the oder. Left of the street are the odd numbers right side the even.


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## Pablo Diablo (Nov 21, 2009)

The UK is the same as Germany.


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## Dahlis (Aug 29, 2008)

Sweden uses the same system as Germany, in Stockholm the central point is the royal palace so the numbers always start at the point thats closest to the palace.


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## woutero (Jan 14, 2008)

In The Netherlands it is the same as it was described in Germany. Some additions:

- The numbering starts at the end of the street that is closest to the city center (so numbers go up as you get further away of the center). 

- Even numbers are on the right side (looking at increasing numbers), odd numbers on the left side.

- Older buildings that are divided up in apartments or condos often have something added to the number. For instance, I live on 113-III (which means the third floor of building 113). Other common additions are a, b, c, d, etc.

- In newer buildings it is common to give each apartment/condo its own number.

- Each apartment/condo has its own individual address. In some countries I have seen that different apartments share an address, and the mail man has to look at the person's name to find the right mailbox. In NL that is not the case.

- In really old buildings it can be a bit complex. My first apartment in Amsterdam was an attic room in an old Canal house. My address was 147-III-VHA (meaning building 147, 3rd floor, back side of front house/Voorhuis Achter).


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## Chicagoago (Dec 2, 2005)

mhays said:


> The US doesn't use distance. It uses sequence everywhere I've seen. But the sequence is tied to street numbers. Whether the street is "6th" or "Elm", it'll start with 600 and the next block is probably 700. Even numbers are generally, but not always, on the west and north sides.
> 
> Tokyo is a disaster. The address will get you to the correct few blocks, then you have to find the non-sequential building number somewhere in those blocks. I learned this while looking for my very small, barely-signed hotel once...


Chicago uses distance. 8 blocks contain 800 address possibilities and is exactly 1 mile. Main streets are 1/4 mile apart, and each contain 200 address possibilities. Side streets are 50 address possibilities apart.


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## Rebasepoiss (Jan 6, 2007)

Chrissib said:


> In Germany it's the sequence of buildings that is used for numbering.
> 
> On one side of the street the numbers go like this: 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15...
> And on the other side like this: 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16...
> ...


It's the same way in Estonia.

It becomes a lot messier in commieblock districts, though, since most of the buildings don't face the street that they're addressed to. The street I live in, is a complete nutshell: Starting from an intersection, buildings on the left side go from 1-23 (both odd and even numbers) and buildings on the right go from 24 onwards. Some buildings are as far as 400m from the actual street. :nuts: Fortunately that's the only such case I know.


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## anakngpasig (Jul 29, 2005)

in my neighborhood, it's even numbers on one side of the street and odd numbers on the other.


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## FML (Feb 1, 2006)

First of all, contrary to Western addressing system, in Japan, it's blocks that have names, not streets. (Major roads do have names, but that's not used for addresses, except of Kyoto and some cities in Hokkaido.)
Therefore, the question would be how the buildings in each blocks are numbered, not the buildings along each street.






The old "modern" addressing system called _chiban_ ("lot number") was introduced in Meiji era (1870s), when they needed to number land owners for taxation. Contrary to what the video claims, as far as I know, they were numbered more or less in geographical order.
The problem was, it was land owners that were numbered, not lands or buildings. So when a land owner moved, the corresponding number moved too, brings you the total chaos of addresses - Your building may be numbered 3, and next to the buildings number 53, 8-2, 38, 1, 1792. They stopped moving addresses shortly, but land-owner based numbers still had problems. Let's say a land owner sold his (same-numbered) land to two buyers. One buyer will have a new land number - in other words, "buildings are numbered from the oldest to newest".

The system (or the lack of the system) was cumbersome, so in 1960s, they decided to introduce the new system, now numbering buildings, not lands. The process is slow, but nowadays, most addresses in urban area tend to use the new _jukyo hyoji_ (residence indication) system. The system differs in each municipalities/areas, but in many cases, buildings are numbered clockwise, based on 10m distance. Therefore, the house next to the house number 7 may be number 8, 9, or perhaps 7, depending on the distance. If two buildings have same 7, then you will have suffix numbers, like 7-1, 7-2.


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## djm19 (Jan 3, 2005)

FML said:


> First of all, contrary to Western addressing system, in Japan, it's blocks that have names, not streets. (Major roads do have names, but that's not used for addresses, except of Kyoto and some cities in Hokkaido.)
> Therefore, the question would be how the buildings in each blocks are numbered, not the buildings along each street.
> 
> 
> ...


Seems like it would be difficult to give directions.


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## Mustaa (Sep 5, 2009)

In Brazil it seems that the numbers are chosen randomly, you can have a house numbered 503 and on it's side there can be a house 3578.


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## MauricioP (Jun 28, 2010)

Mustaa said:


> In Brazil it seems that the numbers are chosen randomly, you can have a house numbered 503 and on it's side there can be a house 3578.


Where do you live? Everywhere I've been in Brazil numbered houses by distance.


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## Eddard Stark (Mar 31, 2008)

In Italy - which follows more or less the rest of Europe - there are though several exceptions.

In Venice numbers do not refer to the street (which is most often a small alley) but to the "sestiere" (one of the six neighborhood of Venice). So in each Sestiere you have some thousands numbers distributed in a rather caotic way

In many cities (Milan for examples) numbers refer to the "building" while in many others it refers to the single shop or entrance (so each shop/bulding entrance has a number)

In Florence (and I do not know if in any other city in Italy) they have a double numbering: one for building entrances and one for shops, in different colours: blue for residential buildings, red for commercial ones. Or blue for the entrance of a building and red for the shops at the ground floor

Are you confused?


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## woutero (Jan 14, 2008)

In The Netherlands in 99% of the cases it is as described above, but in the height of systematic town planning in the '70s there were experiments with a different system: not the streets were named, but the neighborhoods. 

Within these neighborhoods the homes are numbered in a logical order. Often a 4 or 5 digit number. For instance you would get the 16.000 series on one street and the 18.000 series on another.

Sounds logical, but unfortunately it was also the time of highly irregular street patterns and dead end streets, where you quickly lose any sense of direction you might have. So these neighborhoods feel like a confusing maze of irregular streets, identical homes and high numbers. Signs are used to direct you to the right number. If the signs were ever to go missing, you might be lost in there for days!

On Google Maps it looks like this:

Lelystad: Jol









Lelystad: Karveel









Hoofddorp: Graan voor Visch









Wayfinding:


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## mgk920 (Apr 21, 2007)

In the USA, the norm is distance from a baseline.

OTOH, I don't know if anyone has ever figured out how address numbers are assigned in Manhattan, NYC.

Mike


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## JordanEDunston7789 (Oct 9, 2011)

in my neighborhood, it's even numbers on one side of the street and odd numbers on the other.


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