How can I rename the private road that starts on my property?

[jlanz]

I inherited a house with a paved private road and I wonder how to rename the road?

I'm inclined to just change the sign but I'm sure that's not the right way to do change the name of a private road.

The road has a public easement but it's a "privately maintained" road wholly on private property (my house plus two neighbors).

The beginning, where the road sign is, is wholly on my property but then it goes to the two neighbor's property (it's about a half mile long but a lot of that is just a dirt road to the last house).

I'm wondering what the process is to rename the road?

Have any of you renamed a road before?

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[Trencherman]

Just wondering here-- do you think it might depend on the state, county, city/town where it's located? Do you think it might have been helpful to mention that in your OP?

[trader4]

Hmmm. It's privately maintained and serves 3 properties. That would seem to indicate that all 3 property owners would share in the maintenance and responsibility for the road. In that case, clearly the first place to start would be the other 2 property owners. If they don't wish to change the name, that's probably the end of the road, don't ya think?

If they do and you get past that point, then obviously the next step is to talk to the municipality officials and see what they have to say. Even though it's privately owned and maintained, it's likely they have a say in the matter. And I wouldn't go very far without getting the other 2 property owners to agree upfront in writing. Otherwise you may spend a lot of effort for nothing.

[WW]

Is that road name part of your mail address?? WW

[RicodJour]

Also, is it on Google Maps? Changing the sign might confuse mail delivery, FedEX and mapping programs.

R

[hallerb]

To rename it you must bring it up to current intersate highway specs:)

3 foot of base, 2 foot thick rebar reinforced concrete, in your area high effiicency road lights, that power bill is going to cost you now till you sell:)

Then theres snow plowing, paying the town many fees,, and getting the issue put on the next ballot, so hire a high priced attorney:)

Just joking but why do you want to change the name?

Is it like ossama bin laden blvd ?? :):):)

[Bill]

You fill out a "Road Name Change Request Form"...

Or search google.com for the words... road name change request

[aemeijers]

Possible, but likely not worth it unless you have major reasons for wanting to do so. Are the mail boxes out by the real road, or in front of the houses? Do people mail to a RR number, or to the name of the private road? Does the tax assessor and the deed office have the properties recorded by lot number in a subdivision plat of record with assigned street names, a 'metes and bounds' description, a section description, or what? And whatever records they have, do they have a line that says 'commonly known as 1234 Whatever Drive?. Basically, if there is an official record of the current name anywhere, whatever officials control those offices will have to bless any change. Do it without official blessing, and you might lose mail service, and complicate future tax and property transfer transactions. Not to mention, of course, have fire/police/ambulance calls go astray.

In old maps of this town, lots of streets in the older part of town have different names. Most were renamed to make traffic arteries have the same name from end-to-end, but some 'prestigious' sounding names were stolen by well-connected developers for the then-new fancy subdivisions on the south side of town. (Streets named after presidents or local power families, mainly.)

-- aem sends...

[Jon Danniken]

We have a bunch of those as well, streets named after presidents. Quiet and unassuming, they are mostly in residential areas, for neighborhoods.

About 10 years ago, we still had a Centennial Boulevard, created in 1959 in honor of the Centennial of the State of Oregon. It was a big deal for those of us who live here and are proud Oregonians.

Of course they renamed to MLK Boulevard. It's where the University of Oregon football stadium is located. Bunch of carpetbaggers from out of state came in and raised a ruckus, then the mayor caved in and signed the order.

Bastards. All of 'em. Bastards.

Jon

[Oren]

San Francisco is stopping the Martin Luther King parade, after 24 years. Figger they will eventually change the street name.

Shyte! In LA there are now tours of 'gangsta' areas. A 2 hour tour, lunch stop... The disclaimer is you sign away your right to life. One stop is Watts.

Think what those street names are?!!

I can call any street what I want to. If you don't know how to 'git' to 'pole crossing' - whay back where the moonshine was famous.

[Metspitzer]

I have read many news stories that end bad because the fire/ambulance did not find the address.

[Oren]

Outstanding. One of my former homes was overlooking Saranac Lake, NY.

The copy of the title search was about two inches thick. Apparently the land had an Indian trail where my house sat on the top of the hill. Not sure if was "Algonquin Indians".

"...this region is now called the ?Adirondacks?, a Native American name meaning ?bark eaters.?

[Oren]

Flicking the remote the other day, I happened on _world's dumbest employees_.

They made a cartoon likeness of the audio. After the call, 911 response, another call from the chest pain fellow, EMT couldn't read his GPS in the 'bam balance'. The elder bride drove the guy after about two hours wait time.

It was in TN somewhere.

[aemeijers]

Oren wrote:

I can easily believe it. Not to excuse any errors or incompetence of the local emergency services like that, but in rural hill country in many states, the roads follow the bottom of the valleys, and are extremely poorly documented. Roads can have 2 or 3 names, sometimes. The traditional name, the name the road commission calls it, and what the postmaster calls it. And they are often so-called 'private' roads, no more than a glorified gravel driveway, and not documented at all, other than maybe as an easement. You can be less than a crow mile from a neighbor, but be ten miles by road. In a less well-off county, the ambulance is often 20 miles away, and there aren't but 2 or 3 for the whole county. With the recent housing semi-collapse, there are many yuppie 'country estate' subdivisions out in the boonies that the developer never got the road paved/documented, and maybe 2-3 people live way in the back, with the lots in front going back to scrub forest. For city folk moving to country like that, it is a good idea to stop by the sheriff's office and fire department to say hi and introduce themselves, and ask to look at the map the dispatch operator uses, and make sure their road (all of it) is in fact on there. This is especially true for folks building a new house on a narrow winding road with no fire hydrants, and the mailboxes are all out by the big road. (I've seen a few semi-rich people who even added a pond to their property so the FD would have a place to draft water from.)

-- aem sends...

[Tony]

Last visit here my brother used his GPS thing to find my road. Following the instructions, he passed my road and turned onto a stone drive that only goes 30 feet. Many maps show a road there, and many show only the 30 or less feet at either end. I'm not sure if it once was a road, or if it was only a "paper" road that never got built. Between the 2 ends of the paper road are cattle out in a pasture and some rough terrain.

[aemeijers]

Yepper. Lotsa abandoned rural roads like that around here, and in town, several ghost subdivisions from the 1910s through the 1970s that never got past having the land platted out, and maybe the sewers installed. Mapquest, et al, keep insisting they are valid roads.

-- aem sends...

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

There's a map mistake around here. They show a road that isn't there. There was a map mistake where I used to live. These mistakes show up on EVERY map.

[hallerb]

They all use the same database, and there are lots of errors. But considering everything its remarkably accurate

[aemeijers]

Some of those mistakes, at least in the old days, were on purpose, to see if somebody was bootlegging their maps. Map publisher would drive around their market area, and buy a copy of all the competitor's maps. If the mistake was also on the competitor's map, they had a pretty good case in court for copyright infringement. In the old days before the judge told Ma Bell she had to share, they did the same thing with phonebook listings. I think they still do it with commercial junk mail databases- they add fake addresses that come back to them, so they know if people are using their list without paying.

-- aem sends...

[Stormin Mormon]

I've heard of "seeding" the mailing lists like that. Add a couple names.

My old neighborhood, most of the maps were wrong. I remember my Dad wrote to a map company one time. I don't think he heard back.

And when I got some free maps off the NYS Thruway, I wrote and told them about some mistakes. I know I never heard back.