[Talk-GB] Made-up motorway junction names

[Mark Goodge]

On 06/01/2023 13:41, Jass Kurn wrote:
> 
> We're veering off topic, but it starts a discussion on who is the 
> definitive source for a street name, when considering only the Highways 
> Authority, OS, and Royal Mail.

Like cats, streets can have several different names :-)

When considering canonical names, one point to bear in mind is that, in 
English law, names (of anything, not just streets) are abbreviation, 
case and punctuation insensitive. So "St John's Road" (with an 
apostrophe and an abbreviation) is exactly the same name as"Saint Johns 
Road" (no apostrophe or abbreviation), and "Green Hill Street" (three 
words) is the same as "Greenhill Street" (two words).

For recently named roads (eg, in new developments) this isn't generally 
an issue, since the form used by the naming authority is generally 
replicated by all other authorities. But for older streets, different 
authorities may well use different forms, especially if local usage has 
changed over the years.

> The Highways Authority MUST use the correct name in a Traffic Order. The 
> Highways Authority is also responsible for naming and maintaining a 
> database of street names. Nationally this is brought together as the 
> National Street Gazetteer. The National Street Gazetteer, has the name 
> of the road you mention as "CLACTON ROAD" (USRN: 39900370). So the 
> Highways Authority does have the correct road name in the 
> temporary speed restriction you give.

Actually, it's generally the planning authority, not the highway 
authority, which assigns names to new developments and is responsible 
for maintaining those in the NSG. In two-tier systems, the planning 
authority is usually the district/borough/city council, while the 
highway authority is the county council.

> But, OS has a different name, and are widely considered a definitive 
> source. OS is not a definitive source for a Street Name. But, their 
> street name data is available to OSM, and we respect OS, so do we use OS 
> names in preference to the definitive version used by the Highways 
> Authority? I'd like to know the official position of the OS on 
> differences in Street Names.

OS is more likely to use the variant of a name in common use. For 
example, a lot of planning authorities have a policy that they won't 
have apostrophes in road names. But, if it's been commonly spelled with 
an apostrophe since before that policy was introduced, then OS will 
typically still render it with an apostrophe even though the NSG will 
not have an apostrophe.

> Then we have street names in Royal Mail addresses. Since this source 
> would always be less trustworthy than Highways Authorities and OS, I 
> would leave them out of the discussion.

For newly named streets with addressable objects (eg, buildings) on 
them, Royal Mail always uses the name assigned by the naming authority. 
But, again, there are a lot of legacy names in the system which predate 
the current authorities and the NSG, and Royal Mail won't necessarily 
update their records to use the NSG name if the older name is still in 
widespread current use.

Mark