Need More Easily Identified Buildings

Hello experts! I need some inventive ideas on how we might number our townhome community so that the buildings could be identified more easily - especially in the case of an emergency!

We have two streets only - example Redland Way that is the "main drag" and cross-street Redland Circle. The problem is our 140+ units (26 buildings)are numbered the same on either street. Example - there is a 2408 Redland Way, and a 2408 Redland Circle! (Genius, huh?!) Please note, each building has multiple units with their own addresses, such as 2408, 2410, and 2412 all on one building. Over the past couple years since being built, there has been great confusion to any visitors, evidenced by delivery personnel, pizza people, friends, etc. I fear valuable time may be lost some day during an emergency. This is exacerbated by the centermost buildings (the ones not facing any particular street) being divided so that one row of four buildings will have two buildings classified as Way, and the other two being Circle (on the same row)! Hope this makes sense - hard to explain without a map!

The board has discussed options such as numbering buildings 1 - 26 respectively and placing numbers on building walls (brick) streetside. Kind of unsightly? Also, not "official" to postal service, and can't necessarily force residents to use so may not be effective. We also thought stenciling the numbers on the sidewalk such as many homes do...but we can't certainly put each home number on the curb or there would be no room!

Any ideas would be appreciated! I don't want any residents to lose precious time during an emergency, because our number/street system was poorly designed. Thanks to all!

Wouldn't it be easier to change Redland Circle to another name entirely? Although it would be a pain and inconvenience to the people currently living there to have new checks and stationary printed it seems like it would be beneficial in the long run. If they are dedicated streets you will need to work through your local city or county government.

As for easily distinguishing them for emergency personnel contact your local fire and police chief s and ask for their imput.

Changing a street name can be difficult. In my case, it was very easy. But there were only nine houses on my street and all houses agreed with the change. But I don't think that will help this poster unless they change what street a building is assigned to (then also requiring new numbers which is going to be a higher level of headache).

Sometimes in multi-family dwellings there is no clear street to assign the building. So the developer quickly glances and chooses a street. In this case, whoever did it probably tried to strike a balance in the most sensible way that 30 seconds will allow.

I personally think they are on the right track of labeling the buildings. First, you don't have to ask city council for the change. And while I was told that not everyone had to agree, I was expected to try hard to get everyone to agree. The amount of effort required is not linear with the number of units involved. Too many and it becomes harder and harder until you give up on one owner.

I would try hard to make the labels be functional and as esthetically pleasing as possible. And I would seek feedback from interested people and a slice of those who don't care enough to seek giving feedback.

KM1,

If there is no huge objection I would go to the City and ask that one of the roads be renamed. In our area developers chose a name and if it is not already taken the City usually oks it. Explore this with your councilman/woman and when you see that indeed you may request a street change name survey homeowners to see how they feel. I would think the "emergency" issue would be enough to have them go through the angst of changing their mailing addresses.

Robert,

You have such good ideas. The hoa can have someone from the fire company address all the homeowners at a meeting.

Changing street names simply will not resolve the issue that is presented here.

1) It is not obvious which street a given building belongs with regardless of the name.

2) It is not obvious what set of numbers belong to each building.

Also, I can tell you from personal experience that changing a street name is no picnic. City Council was easy to get by. I took a petition to all my neighbors and everyone signed it. City Council passed the measure unanimously and several members thanked me personally for taking on the issue.

It has taken three months to get my new street into the USPS database. The local post office had the new address quickly. But alas, they couldn't tell me straight for 6 weeks. And many times people assume that a change of address means I have moved. Then I have to explain to them when it isn't the case. And who knows how long it will take for maps systems to update...

On the other hand a label can be slapped on the building as quickly as a sign maker can make the signs. And nobody has to change their address. The postal service isn't the one getting lost. It is the poor delivery person who isn't sure what street a given building belongs to. Or happens to not quickly do the math to calculate which stairs the address belongs to.

But it is easy to add: "I am in building three on the left side as you approach from the parking lot on Blah Blah Circle."

Many many thanks to everyone for all their input and ideas! And what a great many points to consider! It's been about three years until we could look ourselves up on any website-map-search engine!! And as Kirk pointed out, the situation couldn't be helped by street name changing due to the unique way our buildings are divided.

I am going to seek final inputs from our emergency personnel across the street and then make my recommendations.

Thanks again! I can always count on great feedback here at HOATalk!

Respectfully,

Karen