In cities with big series of numbered streets, how many numbers are in a mile?

[KCRoadFan]

In Chicago, numbered streets that are a mile apart differ by 8. Here in Kansas City, where I live, that's the same for the most part.

On the other hand, if you go for a mile up or down a given avenue in Manhattan, New York City, you'll have gone by 20 numbered streets.

As far as other cities around the country with big sets of numbered streets (at least 50 streets total), how many of those numbered streets are equivalent to a mile?

[Big John]

In Milwaukee it is 8 north-south, but 16 east-west.

[pianocello]

Indianapolis is inconsistent, but it's generally 8-10 numbers per mile. Past 86th St, it's consistently 10.

Gary and the parts of Lake County that follow its system is 8 per mile, which is unsurprising due to its proximity to Chicago.

I can't think of any other cities in Indiana that fit the 50-street minimum, but there are plenty of large cities that have a general block structure without numbered streets.

[GaryV]

In some Michigan counties (e.g. Kent and Ottawa) it's 8 to the mile. I believe Kalamazoo County has 2 numbers per mile. City streets in Royal Oak, it's 16 to the mile - but there's only 2nd through 7th Streets.

Kalamazoo and Calhoun Counties have lettered county roads. In Calhoun there's 16 letters to the mile. In K'zoo it's 8 letters to the mile with half-mile roads using the letters of the preceding and following mile avenues (e.g UV Ave).

[TheStranger]

San Francisco has two sets of numbered streets.

The South of Market/Mission District/Potrero Hill/Dogpatch numbered street grid, from 1 to about 30:

in SOMA, the gap is about 0.1895 miles per number street block, so approximately 6 blocks to 1 mile.

This changes around the 9th and 10th Street area where the blocks are a bit more compresed, due to Mission Street making its turn from southwest to direct south.  The gap between 8th and 9th is 0.1273 miles and the gap between 9th and 10th is only 0.093 miles (half of the gaps before).

11th to 12th is about 0.13 mile

13th to 14th is about 0.07 mile

After that, the gap is consistently 0.11 miles between numbered streets, from 14th all the way to the 30th.

---

For the Avenues (the Outside Lands areas of Sunset District and Richmond District), the spacing is far more consistent, except in areas where the hills severely affect the grid.

The gap between the numbered avenues is about 0.05 mile, or around 20 blocks per mile.

[Brandon]

In Chicago and surrounding areas, it's 8 to the mile, except as follows:

Madison to Roosevelt - 12
Roosevelt to Cermak (22nd) - 10
Cermak to 31st Street - 9
8 blocks to the mile thereafter to the Will-Kankakee County Line.

[mgk920]

In Chicago and surrounding areas, it's 8 to the mile, except as follows:

Madison to Roosevelt - 12
Roosevelt to Cermak (22nd) - 10
Cermak to 31st Street - 9
8 blocks to the mile thereafter to the Will-Kankakee County Line.

In the very early 20th century, Edward P. Brennan wanted it to be 10 numbering blocks per section, but the Chicago City Council of the time decided to make it 8 and Brennan agreed.

Mike

[CoreySamson]

In Tulsa and surrounding areas, it's 10 numbers per mile outside of downtown. Makes navigation relatively easy. But in some surrounding areas like Broken Arrow, it's 16 numbers per mile.

[6a]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

[Rothman]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

Still a tame grid...

[jt4]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

It always struck me as odd that the numbering started not at downtown but around the middle of the Short North.

[pderocco]

The survey of the Palmdale and Lancaster area in northern Los Angeles County numbers the N/S streets ten to a mile, with a Division St in the middle. The E/W avenues have letters starting with A on the county line and increasing southward, but they number the in-between streets in 16ths of a mile, so a half mile avenue might be called A-8. That's kind of interesting because that divides each square mile into 160 possible lots, and given that a square mile is 640 acres, those would be 4-acre lots, 110 by 176 yards. But that doesn't leave any room for the roads, so the lot sizes aren't actually nice even subdivisions of a square mile.

By the way, the highest existing avenue is Z-8, off county route N4.

[Konza]

In the Phoenix area, it's generally 8 to the mile as well.

In Omaha, the numbered streets run north-south, and they are 12 to the mile.

[6a]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

It always struck me as odd that the numbering started not at downtown but around the middle of the Short North.

I've never figured that out, nor the reason there's no 1st St. And why 2nd and 3rd is broken up by High.

[6a]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

Still a tame grid...

I do agree with you there, it just doesn't seem to fit into the general Midwest theme of evenly spaced numbered streets. When I was in college many years ago, a professor said the streets were laid out along property lines. Of course, they had no way of knowing how that would affect today's world.

[DandyDan]

In the Phoenix area, it's generally 8 to the mile as well.

In Omaha, the numbered streets run north-south, and they are 12 to the mile.

Lincoln, NE also has numbered N-S streets, but their streets are 14 to a mile. Elements of both the Omaha and Lincoln systems appear in Cass County, Nebraska,  which makes for an interesting system.

[roadman65]

In Chicago, numbered streets that are a mile apart differ by 8. Here in Kansas City, where I live, that's the same for the most part.

On the other hand, if you go for a mile up or down a given avenue in Manhattan, New York City, you'll have gone by 20 numbered streets.

As far as other cities around the country with big sets of numbered streets (at least 50 streets total), how many of those numbered streets are equivalent to a mile?

NYC has a grid laid out since the 1800's called the Commissioners Plan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commissioners%27_Plan_of_1811
Some streets like Madison and Lexington Avenues are not part of it and the distance between those two avenues and the next block either way are one half the distance than that of the numbered avenues across.

So, for example, the distance between Madison and Fifth Avenues is half of that between Fifth and Sixth or let's say First and Second.  Streets though maintains 5.5 miles for 110 blocks hence the length of Lexington Avenue.

[SectorZ]

Columbus would like to humbly say "have fun figuring this out."

Laughs in Boston accent...

[kphoger]

Lincoln, NE also has numbered N-S streets, but their streets are 14 to a mile.

I used to like Lincoln.  But now that I know that fact, I'm not so sure...

[NWI_Irish96]

Indianapolis has varying numbers of streets to the mile up to 86th Street, after which it's consistently 10 to a mile up to and through Hamilton County.

[Flint1979]

In Chicago, numbered streets that are a mile apart differ by 8. Here in Kansas City, where I live, that's the same for the most part.

On the other hand, if you go for a mile up or down a given avenue in Manhattan, New York City, you'll have gone by 20 numbered streets.

As far as other cities around the country with big sets of numbered streets (at least 50 streets total), how many of those numbered streets are equivalent to a mile?

Not in the first mile it doesn't on Chicago's Southside. The first mile is Roosevelt which is the same as 12th Street.

[mgk920]

In Chicago, numbered streets that are a mile apart differ by 8. Here in Kansas City, where I live, that's the same for the most part.

On the other hand, if you go for a mile up or down a given avenue in Manhattan, New York City, you'll have gone by 20 numbered streets.

As far as other cities around the country with big sets of numbered streets (at least 50 streets total), how many of those numbered streets are equivalent to a mile?

Not in the first mile it doesn't on Chicago's Southside. The first mile is Roosevelt which is the same as 12th Street.

The north-south numbering base of Edward P. Brennan's addressing grid in Chicago is Madison St.  Today, the first actual grid based numbered street is 13th St (just south of Roosevelt Rd).

Mike

[JayhawkCO]

Denver is 10 to the mile. I found this out by sitting at a stoplight at 1st, and seeing that Google Maps said I was 2.5 miles away from my turn on 26th.

[bm7]

In Des Moines and its suburbs it isn't consistent. The most common is probably 14 per mile, but you can also find 8, 10, 16, 18, and 24 in different areas.

[mrsman]

In Chicago, numbered streets that are a mile apart differ by 8. Here in Kansas City, where I live, that's the same for the most part.

On the other hand, if you go for a mile up or down a given avenue in Manhattan, New York City, you'll have gone by 20 numbered streets.

As far as other cities around the country with big sets of numbered streets (at least 50 streets total), how many of those numbered streets are equivalent to a mile?

Not in the first mile it doesn't on Chicago's Southside. The first mile is Roosevelt which is the same as 12th Street.

This is a little bit of a frustrating fact about Chicago.  In the other directions, it's 800 address numbers per mile.   Cottage Grove (1 mile east of State), Halsted (1 mile west of State), and Chicago Ave (1 mile north of Madison) all begin their respective 800 address block, but Roosevelt (1 mile south of Madison) is at 1200.

It is also frustrating that every mile point, which also denotes generally the largest streets in the area are all at the 800 point and are evenly divisible by 800.  Halsted at 800W, Ashland at 1600W, and Western at 2400W, etc.  But in the direction to the south it is: 1200, 2200, 3100, 3900, 4700, etc.  From 31st street onwards, the numbers are 700 too high and not evenly divisible by 800.  It would be better to be off by 800, so at least the big streets would be still divisible by 800 (3200, 4000, 4800), but it's not to be.

Los Angeles also GENERALLY follows the 800 addresses per mile standard.  (Not surprising, the mile system is basically built in to all ciities west of Ohio and mile systems are based on 1/8s 1/4s and 1/2s, where 8 numbered blocks to a mile make perfect sense, a metric based system, if one existed somewhere would likely have 5 or 10 numbered blocks per km.)

The numbered streets aren't all that even, though.  The mile points for the numbered streets (south of the city) are as follows:

Wilshire 700, Pico 1400, Adams 2600, Exposition 3800, Vernon 4400, Slauson 5800, Florence 7200, Manchester 8600, Century 10000, Imperial 11400...  Unfortunately, it's not even or consistent in this direction.