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[vtk]

I'll start this thread with some multiple-entendres from Columbus and surrounds...

Opossum Run Rd: The possums are in charge? (Regionally common waterway name leads to regioonally common road name)

Old Leonard Ave: Who is Old Leonard? (Of course, it's the old path of Leonard Ave, though I'm really not sure how long ago the current Leonard Ave came into existence)

Frank Refugee Expressway: Named after a bluntly honest guy displaced from his homeland? (Actually, it ties in with Frank Rd on one end and Refugee Rd on the other)

Memory Lane: A metaphor? (An actual street, though a private one IIRC)

Seldom Seen Rd: Hidden away? (Seen by thousands of commuters daily)

And then there's the ones you'd joke about in 8th grade.  Southwestern Franklin County has all of Gay, Creamer, Seaman, and Johnson roads within minutes travel.  I can't think of any nearby feminine road names, but there's that Big Beaver Rd near Detroit...

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

I'll start this thread with some multiple-entendres from Columbus and surrounds...

Opossum Run Rd: The possums are in charge? (Regionally common waterway name leads to regioonally common road name)

Old Leonard Ave: Who is Old Leonard? (Of course, it's the old path of Leonard Ave, though I'm really not sure how long ago the current Leonard Ave came into existence)

Frank Refugee Expressway: Named after a bluntly honest guy displaced from his homeland? (Actually, it ties in with Frank Rd on one end and Refugee Rd on the other)

Memory Lane: A metaphor? (An actual street, though a private one IIRC)

Seldom Seen Rd: Hidden away? (Seen by thousands of commuters daily)

And then there's the ones you'd joke about in 8th grade.  Southwestern Franklin County has all of Gay, Creamer, Seaman, and Johnson roads within minutes travel.  I can't think of any nearby feminine road names, but there's that Big Beaver Rd near Detroit...

Leonard Ave. was rerouted when I-670 was extended east in the late 80s/early 90s
And yes, Seldom Seen was named as such because the property owner (pre civil war era) was seldom seen by the other residents in the area.

[apeman33]

Garden City, Kansas, has a stretch of that used to be the local lover's lane. It was once divided with trees down the middle and it was at what was then the far east side of town.

Once the stretch of road was annexed, it was named to reflect it's history. Of course on Garden City's street signs, the name of the road is in HUGE LETTERS and then the "St.", "Ave." or whatever is in tiny letters.

So these street signs read:
OLD LOVERS Ln.

[NE2]

Hershey Highway...

[1995hoo]

South Park Avenue in Friendship Heights, MD.

[M86]

A big pet peeve of mine... Stupid street names.  Northwest Arkansas has a ton of these.  Suits Us Drive off US 71 in Bella Vista.  It'll Do Road near Pea Ridge off AR 72.  Spanker Creek Road is another one in Bella Vista.

It's funny, because when I lived in Sioux Falls, SD, I never noticed any street names that I would call "ridiculous".  Sioux Falls loved to use female names for streets (Louise [major artery in SF], Shirley, Carolyn, Kelley, Meredith, Marion, Cathy). 

[6a]

And yes, Seldom Seen was named as such because the property owner (pre civil war era) was seldom seen by the other residents in the area.

And then there's the story of Africa Rd. which is about as bad an alternate meaning as one can get (think Underground Railroad...)

[berberry]

This comes close to a theory of mine that I don't remember ever telling anyone about (and maybe for good reason, but here goes):  I think I know what caused the proliferation of meaningless street names that seems to affect cities and communities all over the place.  I think Dutch Elm disease is at fault.  This isn't meant to be a joke, by the way; I'm kinda serious.

Seems like everywhere you go you see roads with names that bear no relation to reality.  Scenic Highway in Baton Rouge comes to mind (though I'll concede that maybe at one time that street might have been scenic.  If not, the joke seems to date to about the 1910s).  Why is there never a lake on "Lakeview Street"?  I can never find a park on "Parkview Drive", unless one accepts the British construct "car park" for what the rest of us call a "parking lot".  

Somewhere here in Mississippi - although for the life of me I can't remember exactly where (I want to say Leake County) - there's a rural "Mount Hebron Road", a two- or three-hundred-yard dead-end which, within that distance, drops elevation about 20 feet from the only road to which it has access.

Anyway, I think somebody got the idea for giving streets meaningless and/or joke names about 70 or 80 years ago, once most of the elm trees had been killed and somebody noticed that there were no elms on "Elm Street".

[1995hoo]

Then there are neighborhoods whose street names fit into a naming theme perfectly well but have the misfortune to fall into stupid naming themes. The one that readily comes to mind is the "Friendly Village of Dulles" in Chantilly, Virginia, where the street names follow an airline theme. The main drag in and out is Airline Parkway and all the other streets are named after airlines, many of them defunct. I don't think I'd want to live on Swissair Place or Pan Am Avenue.

There's another neighborhood in froggie's neck of the woods where all the streets are named for colleges and universities—for example, Duke Drive, Vanderbilt Drive, Sweetbriar Drive [sic—Sweet Briar should be two words], Cornell Drive, etc. They're all "drives" for whatever reason. I suppose those names are less off-the-wall for street names than an airline theme, although I know I wouldn't want to live on Clemson Drive (too many memories of a long string of football losses prior to 1990).

[Coelacanth]

I don't know if this is still the case, but for many years the blade signs for East Haskell St in West St Paul read

E Haskell

"That's a lovely dress you're wearing, Mrs Cleaver..."

[Urban Prairie Schooner]

Scenic Highway in Baton Rouge comes to mind (though I'll concede that maybe at one time that street might have been scenic.  If not, the joke seems to date to about the 1910s).  Why is there never a lake on "Lakeview Street"?  I can never find a park on "Parkview Drive", unless one accepts the British construct "car park" for what the rest of us call a "parking lot".

I believe the name "Scenic Highway" derives from the old "Mississippi River Scenic Highway" auto trail of the pre-US Highway era. I guess it sounded nicer than "Bayou Sara Road" or "Jackson Road" which were the common names of the road before that time.

In any case, most nonsensical names come about in suburban areas because they are chosen by developers who don't give a great deal of thought to their street names other than sounding pleasant enough to attract homebuyers. Various combinations of 'lake', 'park', 'wood', 'river', 'oak', and 'tree' tend to be the norm around here.

[agentsteel53]

there is also an obsession with calling an oak "live".  Live Oak, Florida, etc etc.

I don't know of a single "dead oak" against which the live ones must be differentiated.

[J N Winkler]

there is also an obsession with calling an oak "live".  Live Oak, Florida, etc etc.

I don't know of a single "dead oak" against which the live ones must be differentiated.

The term live oak covers several different types of evergreen tree, and is used in contradistinction to true oaks, which are deciduous and lose their leaves in the winter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_oak

The real problem, as I see it, is that a deciduous tree term is being applied to evergreens.

[NE2]

S. Haven, S. Exchange...

[vtk]

Leonard Ave. was rerouted when I-670 was extended east in the late 80s/early 90s

I don't believe that's the whole story. 

Franklin County official map, 1978:


Google, today:


Even in 1978 there was something strange about Leonard Ave hinting at a past realignment.  At that time, there were two intersections along St Clair Ave from which one could go east on Leonard Ave, apparently.  Why they didn't rename part of it to Old Leonard Ave before the 90s, I don't know.  Why Google labels part of the "new" Leonard Ave as Old Leonard Ave is also a mystery, and fodder for another thread.

[NE2]

Initially Leonard continued southwest from Trevitt to Hopkins (midway between Galloway and Monroe): http://www.wardmaps.com/viewasset.php?aid=9861
Later it was extended west, replacing what had been Felton to Jefferson: http://www.historicmapworks.com/Map/US/901440/Plate+028/Columbus+and+Vicinity+1937/Ohio/ http://www.historicmapworks.com/Map/US/901418/Plate+006/Columbus+and+Vicinity+1937/Ohio/
Presumably the first realignment happened when the 'superblock' between Monroe and Trevitt was put in.

[2Co5_14]

When Old Alabama Rd was first re-routed in Emerson GA, the existing road became Old Old Alabama Rd (that state is really old... ).

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=34.119248,-84.766549&spn=0.004263,0.010568&t=h&z=17&vpsrc=6

What would've been really funny if the most recent construction of the Red Top Mountain Rd extension had taken over the Old Alabama Rd name (which would make sense since it is a continuous route.) Then the original would have to become Old Old Old Alabama Rd!

[vtk]

What would've been really funny if the most recent construction of the Red Top Mountain Rd extension had taken over the Old Alabama Rd name (which would make sense since it is a continuous route.) Then the original would have to become Old Old Old Alabama Rd!

On the east side of Springfield, OH, Google shows a Columbus Ave and an Old Columbus Rd.  I'm pretty sure I've seen a map somewhere (possibly the Delorme Atlas & Gazetteer) showing an Oldest Columbus Rd as well...

[1995hoo]

What would've been really funny if the most recent construction of the Red Top Mountain Rd extension had taken over the Old Alabama Rd name (which would make sense since it is a continuous route.) Then the original would have to become Old Old Old Alabama Rd!

On the east side of Springfield, OH, Google shows a Columbus Ave and an Old Columbus Rd.  I'm pretty sure I've seen a map somewhere (possibly the Delorme Atlas & Gazetteer) showing an Oldest Columbus Rd as well...

Within the past 10 or 15 years, Ox Road (VA-123) here in Fairfax County was widened and converted to a dual-carriageway; as part of the work it was realigned in a few places. There was already an "Old Ox Road" that had been around for a long time, so the newly-superseded alignment this time was dubbed "Little Ox Road."

[NE2]

A few places have an Old New Road.

Orlando has a Turkey Leg Road, a short leg from what used to be Turkey Lake Road.

[sandwalk]

Near Norwalk, Ohio:
*There are two parallel north-south county roads named 'Old State Road' and 'New State Road.'  Neither roads have ever had a state route designation......
*Halfway Road just west of town follows a longitudinal line that is exactly halfway between the Indiana and Pennsylvania borders (approx. 111 miles to each border, as the crow flies)

Near Vemilion, Ohio:
*Gore Orphanage Road is one of Ohio's most famous haunted legends; children were supposedly intentionally locked up in the building while it was set on fire and burned down.  However, the road takes its name from an old orphanage that used to sit on a triangular piece of property (called a gore).

Sandusky, Ohio
*The city's streets were specifically platted to incorporate the shape of the Freemason's square and compass symbols. http://maps.google.com/maps?q=sandusky+ohio&hl=en&ll=41.451669,-82.707567&spn=0.01856,0.043945&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=40.052282,56.513672&vpsrc=6&t=k&z=15
*Also, the major east-west thoroughfare through central Erie County is Mason Road.....

[NE2]

Near Norwalk, Ohio:
*There are two parallel north-south county roads named 'Old State Road' and 'New State Road.'  Neither roads have ever had a state route designation......

The state was involved in road building before the 1920s.........................................

[corco]

In any case, most nonsensical names come about in suburban areas because they are chosen by developers who don't give a great deal of thought to their street names other than sounding pleasant enough to attract homebuyers. Various combinations of 'lake', 'park', 'wood', 'river', 'oak', and 'tree' tend to be the norm around here.

Subdivisions are just named after what was there before the subdivision.

[vtk]

In any case, most nonsensical names come about in suburban areas because they are chosen by developers who don't give a great deal of thought to their street names other than sounding pleasant enough to attract homebuyers. Various combinations of 'lake', 'park', 'wood', 'river', 'oak', and 'tree' tend to be the norm around here.

Subdivisions are just named after what was there before the subdivision.

Sometimes that's true of the subdivision itself (example, Hoffman Farms in Hilliard) but not often the streets.  I think Urban Prairie got it right on; the streets usually are named to sound pleasant, so people will want to live there.  One example that comes to mind is Lakefield Dr: there's a field (where apartments were originally planned) but no lake (unless you count a water-retention pond off the end of the street's differently-named extension into the next development, which came decades later).  And there's a street called Scenic Darby View, which on a map looks close enough to Darby Creek to justify the name, but in reality you can't see the creek at all from the street; this one verges on false advertising.

[hobsini2]

South Park Avenue in Friendship Heights, MD.

There is also a South Park Ave (Hwy 44) in Oshkosh, WI.  Named as such because it borders South Park.