[net.nlang] Streets and Numbers

drv (01/17/83)

I recently worked on a system that stored information
by address.  One of the interesting things that we
discovered as we began to define just what an "address"
was in different parts of the country was that in some
locales there are, ready for this, negative house numbers!

The locale was in the northwest, Portland, if my memory
holds true.  Seems they numbered a bunch of houses on a
street that ran into a river.  Later they filled in the
river and extended the street.  Problem: how to number
those new houses on the extension of the old street.
Their solution: negative house numbers!  Isn't life strange.

--Dennis Vogel--