conuly: (Default)
[personal profile] conuly
In book 5, it says that Sirius' house (number 12) is in between numbers 11 and 13. Is this normal for England? In the US, streets are all even on one side, and all odd on the other, so number 12 would be in between 10 and 14, not 11 and 13.
From: [identity profile] thren0dy.livejournal.com
I believe in the UK that they do indeed number houses on one side 1, 2, 3, etc. - and the only reason I know this is from a compliation of The Straight Dope (http://www.straightdope.com) articles I have. I have a weird memory for useless trivia. It was mentioned in an article about the Prime Minister's house (http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_433.html).

The neighborhood also isn't what you could call overcrowded. Number 10 is one of only three remaining houses on Downing, the other two being numbers 11 and 12 (all of which adjoin--having even and odd numbers on opposite sides of the street is an American practice).

From: [identity profile] eofs.livejournal.com
I've lived in England for all 19 years of my life (except the past month, but let's ignore that) and I can tell you that the convention in England *is* to number odd on one side, even on the other (and the numbers are smaller at the town end.) However, I don't find it hard to believe that there are many roads in the country where the numbering is sequential, even though I can't think of any off the top of my head. It is probably more common in villages, or on older roads (I don't know how far back naming conventions go, but roads and buildings can go back to at least the 11th century and I don't know if they would renumber them.)

In England we don't operate on a block system - there is only a single city in the UK that does in fact, Milton Keynes (have you read Good Omens?)

On the estate that my best friend lives on, the numbers skip from 14 to 41 :0) *Talks to him about this query* He reckons it's mostly older Victorian Terraces that do the 1, 2, 3 thing (I have a vague feeling a road I once studied in school might have been 1, 2, 3) He points out that even roads with no houses on one side can be numbered just odds or evens :0)
From: [identity profile] thren0dy.livejournal.com
I was wondering that when I first read it - how do they determine when to stop on one side and start on the other?

I'll have to research this. :D
From: [identity profile] missfahrenheit.livejournal.com
Interesting. I have explored a fair amount of Kent and the Medway towns (and SW London, now- I get lost a lot) and I have never seen a street that doesn't have odd numbers on one side and even on the other, and would probably have been surprised to see anything different. I mean, I know there are some places where houses are numbered like that, but I don't think I've actually seen any myself. It tends to happen more when there are only houses on one side of the road, or something like that.

Grimmauld Place always put me in mind of a sort of square (is that canon or me jumping to conclusions?), and I assumed the houses would have been numbered in a clockwise pattern and no 12 just... wouldn't have been there most of the time. Of course, the magical argument above is excellent :)

Date: 2004-10-03 03:57 am (UTC)
deceptica: (Default)
From: [personal profile] deceptica
I wouldn't say that it's an exclusively American practice... here it's done the same way.

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