Streets and Avenues

I'll be perfectly honest and admit there isn't too much I don't like about living in Ottawa. I like the city. I like the people. The weather is usually pretty good. I have access to a lot of other places with very little travel required.

However there is one pet peeve I have. They do not name roadways properly in this town.

In Winnipeg and most of western Canada there is a basic convention to naming the routes you travel. Streets run north and south while avenues run east and west.

This naming convention is very useful. When you are looking for a place you know generally which way the pavement is laid out just by the name. This is not the case in Ottawa.

Today I took this picture looking west down Somerset Street East. Even though it is a nice winter street scene, in my mind, it should be a picture of Somerset Avenue. It provides order and convenience.

I don't think I will be able to change any of this and frankly it doesn't have that much of an impact on my life. I'm not suggesting Ottawa becomes as orderly and boring as Edmonton or Calgary where they simply number their streets but calling north-south thoroughfares streets and east-west routes avenues is not all that difficult.

All that being said, if this is my biggest complaint, I think life is going really well.