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anntn6b

Pretensions and names of subdivisions

anntn6b
17 years ago

Our part of the boondocks has already dealt with superfluous 'e's. As in River Pointe, which we locals all pronounced as River PointEEE, which was enough to get the final e dropped.

In more affluent areas with higher taxes, the superfluous e's are alive and well.

But last night I heard a commercial for a new place called Bell Monday. Yep, the announcer said it at least eight times. I didn't have the heart to see if it really is Bell Monday or if it's Belle Monde. I expect there's a multiplier involved: French name? add 7% to the cost of a building lot.

Comments (33)

  • petra_gw
    17 years ago

    The pretensions (and Pointes) are sprouting here as well. Hubby and I are hoping someone will be bamboozled into unknowingly naming a subdivison a terribly rude name in French or Spanish. :o)

  • sylviatexas1
    17 years ago

    A developer named Rose is putting in a subdivision here:
    can't remember the name of the division, probably Rose Pointe, smirk...
    but 2 streets are named...

    Old Blush & Malmaison!

    Yay!

  • michelle_co
    17 years ago

    Bwahaha! My brother's land has skyrocketed in value, and he decided to subdivide. He had to come up with a name for the main driveway through it during a meeting with the planning department. He cracked under pressure and named it Buddy Lane - Buddy being his dog's name, and the only name he could think of at that moment. :-) Ooooh his wife was not impressed.

    Cheers,
    Michelle

  • robbiezone5
    17 years ago

    a'ight, labrea... you forgot another one in brooklyn: BOCOCA (BOreum hill, CObble hill, CArol gardens). now, i think that's pretty silly...

    --robbie--

  • pagan
    17 years ago

    we gave the local award to the newest subdivision - Shinnecock!

  • lesdvs9
    17 years ago

    I moved into a subdivision named Park Place last summer:) I can't get Monopoly out of my mind now.

  • ursulita
    17 years ago

    The Onion had a statshot about it a while ago. I think "Northe Weste Pointe Shoppes" sounds good. :P

    Here is a link that might be useful: What Are We Naming Our New Mall?

  • anntn6b
    Original Author
    17 years ago

    Just after I wrote the above, I learned that our other next door neighbor, who had been in a nursing home for years, had passed. 250 acres between us and Blaine will be developed. Fairly soon as one of her sons had it surveyed six years ago. I can see the "e"s now.

  • rosesinny
    17 years ago

    I love how they come up with these "dreamy" names as if to connote some lifestyle - all the "Estates", "Pointes", "Acres", etc.

    But if you're talking about New York, it just gets ridiculous. THere is an area in Brooklyn called Park Slope, because it does indeed slope away from the Park. It became trendy in the later 80s. Now it apparently encompasses everything in West Brooklyn between the park and New Jersey so you have South Slope, West Slope, North Slope, etc. Some NY places were actually settlements or villages at one time, so their names make sense. But the acronyms and dumb names like Nolita, DUMBO, etc., just get silly IMO.

    On a brighter note, when I was a kid my father was a builder. I just found out a couple of years ago that there is a street named after me. When he was developing a subdivision they needed a name for one of the streets and apparently my mother told him to name it after me. Never knew anything about it and I'm sure if any of the people living there now were aware of it, they'd immediately change the name.

  • sandis
    17 years ago

    Hi all,

    There's a development being built just off our private road. Don't know what it will be called. We already have Knight's Wind a few miles away. Also, a development guy called us wanting to buy the whole hillside we live on. No sale! LOL

    Sandi

  • kittymoonbeam
    17 years ago

    Almost moved into a house on a street named deadwood- just not the good vibe for gardening I was hoping for.....Looking for a paradise lane or some such more suitable name for my rose garden. My folks used to own land on a Hunkydory lane in the country. Years later someone built a house there and we saw it on TV- rains made it slide out onto the main highway. Glad we never moved there!

  • hoovb zone 9 sunset 23
    17 years ago

    Knight's Wind, oh my, makes me think of a guy in armour who has eaten a lot of beans.

    Here the trend is just one word, preferably Italian -- Cortebella, Belagio, Tuscany, etc.

  • malmason
    17 years ago

    One of the subdivision has the street name all starting with "Park". If the name are really different, that is ok, but obviously the developer run out of his imagination. I was once lost in the neighborhood and drove about 10 minutes after reading Park Brush Cir, Park Brush Ct, Park Holly Ct, Park Brush Ln, Park Royale Cir, Park Royale Ct, Park Canyon Dr, Park Royale Lne, Park Royale Dr, Park Bend Dr... I thought I can never find my friend's house.

  • michaelalreadytaken
    17 years ago

    I have to admit to having never paid attention to the trailing "e." I spotted one a few days ago: "Hiddenbrooke."

    It sounds like something out of a Seinfeld routine. If it's hidden, how does anyone know it's there...

    Reminds me of the scene from You, Me, and Dupree where they're out at the site of the newly proposed subdivision, which is in the middle of flat, empty, barren desert and the name of the subdivision is "The Oaks at----"

    MichaelAT

  • jody
    17 years ago

    Malmason's post made me laugh. My bonus children live with their mother in one of those hideous subdivision blights on the Raleigh landscape with those "duplicate" street names, court, circle, lane, street, etc. After 10 months I STILL can't find their house - the place is a maze, the street names all look alike and are posted on artsy signs that are impossible to read at night and you can't tell one house from another. Well, that's not exactly true, there are about 4 house plans and they've built them over and over and over again with about 3 color schemes - within two blocks you've completely lost track.

    My poor MIL was lost in their for two hours once. She refuses to go back.

    Its a something Hall. That's popular in Cary and Apex, the subdivisions are all named something Hall.

  • meredith_e Z7b, Piedmont of NC, 1000' elevation
    17 years ago

    Great thread! Around here we have those duplicate names and cookie cutter houses with no yard... give me the country and pet bulls next door.

    We have all kinds of 'Run' names ever since Catherine Crosby [Bing] made her home in Bermuda Run. Now there is Quail Run... and others that blur. I'm thinking the truth now that so many woods are being cleared is more like:

    Possum Squash Acres
    Deer Crash Lane

    :>

    Alas, my dad's childhood friend finally sold the beautiful hill on our road, but he swears it's just for 5 acre houses.

    We are, in fact, selling a part of the land across the street because a man grew up on the other side of the woods [now developed] and he wants his kids to grow up like he did. He saw the land and twisted our hearts ;]

    I grew up in Sherwood Forest, behind Friar Tuck... close to Robinhood Rd, etc. "not the one in England" as we kids were all answered growing up. Guess who played Maid Marion a lot!?!

    (Factoid: Picasso's rug-designing offspring lives in Sherwood Forest behind my old house [next to my longtime best friend who ended up as an MTV VJ in India]...)

    I bet Ann knows which rose nursery is off Robinhood Rd, too!

  • anntn6b
    Original Author
    17 years ago

    Yep.
    But I know something about "Runs". In my home part of the Piedmont of Virginia, the common (harking back to Olde England) name for small creeks is Run. Where I was a child, our home's western boundary was Mountain Run.
    So Bermuda Run doesn't have a lot of meaning. Whups. Don't look for meaning in subdivision names. Unless they mean Bermuda Grass Run...a subdivision that floods occassionally for the non-gardeners among us.

  • meredith_e Z7b, Piedmont of NC, 1000' elevation
    17 years ago

    LOL, the only stream I can think of there is named Muddy Creek. Muddy Run... not so good ;] Maybe Bermuda was a good idea!

    OTOH, Muddy Creek is a great, to-the-point name!

  • farmgirl
    17 years ago

    It's been a long time since I've posted on the forum, but I could not resist this thread. My family and I have been unsuccessful in selling our 9+ acres of Sacramento view property for over 2 years. The main problem has been choosing the wrong realtors. Anyway, the last go-round got tangled up with a developer who had grandiose plans for the land. Since Shirland Park "Estates" was taken, he called this hypothetical development Shirland Park View. Three parcels at three+ acres each, one of which was in a ravine. The view would have been tricky unless you didn't mind looking down into the pond.

    BTW: Sometimes the city or county decides what the names of the streets will be. If the overlapping names bug you, try being a mail carrier dealing with duplicate house numbers on the streets with overlapping names. It's like the brain trust can't go to the next higher number.

  • debrazone9socal
    17 years ago

    Look, it could be worse. We have a couple of streets near here named Lemp and Klump. I just couldn't live on those streets..."oh, my house is on Klump Street!!!" Ugh.

    The big thing around here is to reorganize the neighborhoods to take advantage of nearby affluent neighborhoods. Like you can't stand being North Hollywood anymore? Hate being known as a blighted area? No problem!! Just rename your neighborhood "Valley Village" or "Valley Glen" or "Valley Village adjacent" or "Beverly Hills Post Office" (I'm not kidding about that one!). People get so desperate to avoid being associated with a bad area! But what's so bad about Van Nuys?

    I have no idea what horrible names they are giving to new developments; they are too far from where I live. But I know they have really ridiculous names, like "Sherwood Forest" no kidding...like Robin Hood is going to come and steal your 5 car garage?

  • pete41
    17 years ago

    I find it annoying when they bulldoze a forest and then call it ``Forest Glen'' or Piney Woods Estate,etc..

  • pagan
    17 years ago

    cosied up on Knightsbridge Road, here in Stirling Forest, to read this threade...

  • kathwhit
    17 years ago

    My house is just off Lynx Hollow Rd. And I did see a Lynx there once. But the subdivisions with cutsie names are coming our way.
    Kathy

  • klimkm
    17 years ago

    Reminds me of a development near here in a suburb of Chicago. The developer must have been really sentimental because all the streets are named "buttercup lane", "bluebird street. etc. etc. I kid you not...

    It reminds me of a comedian I once heard... can't remember who... who once said that subdivisions are where they chop down all the trees and then name the streets after them.

    Since we are in the fox river valley every other development is fox something... fox crest, fox ridge, fox heights, fox estates. on and on.

  • bettym_grow
    17 years ago

    Michelle that is so funny! Buddy Lane...Lol!
    There is a town here in Michigan named Milan. When we first moved here I kept pronouncing it like the Italian way Mee-lan but apparently they pronounce it My-lan. go figure.

    There's also a Saline but they pronounce it Saw-leen.
    Funny.

  • jody
    17 years ago

    This thread has me on the alert for subdivision names now. I've start making quick tours through subdivisions to see if they live up to their names. On my trip home yesterday...

    On Lake Brandt Rd which really does go to Lake Brandt (eventually), I found Brandt Forest - miles from the lake and lacking any trees taller than the top of my little pickup truck. Down the street, I found Century Oaks, no oaks, no trees old enough to stand up on their own (if you know what I mean). A little further down the road, Millicent's Pond - no pond, I looked.

    DH wonders why I get lost on the way home!!!

  • anntn6b
    Original Author
    17 years ago

    Jody,
    Maybe Millicent's Pond first choice name was Millicent's Mosquito and Frog Habitat?
    And we've got another one in these parts that could have been named "Knoxville's Sanitary Landfill, but for the actions of locals who saved the ground water."
    We are still waiting so see what the one next door will be named.
    Ann

  • harryshoe zone6 eastern Pennsylvania
    17 years ago

    This is making me laugh and wince as I read. It is funny, as Pete says, they destroy every living tree and green thing, and then name it Maple Meadow. I couldn't help think of better names:

    Nuked Desolation Estates

    Plastic Pastures

    Over Manicured Meadows

    Nature Violation Vista

    Royale Taxrise Acres

    McMansion Monstrosity View

  • debrazone9socal
    17 years ago

    Or how about Love Canal Estates?

  • bettym_grow
    17 years ago

    Klimkm,
    Buttercup lane does not sound half as bad as my friend's street name "Honeysuckle Ln." I find that name embarrassing.
    Especially the last part. Can't see myself telling a repairman to come to ...suckle anything.

  • triple_b
    16 years ago

    Depends on what your repairman looks like! ;-D

  • sylviatexas1
    16 years ago

    Shady Oaks (no shade, no oaks)
    Meadow Brooke (no meadow, no brook)
    Valley Ridge (if it's a valley, isn't it the opposite of a ridge?)

    & there's a new one here called....

    "The Splendor".