I heard a seismologist on the radio here describe Seattle as "an hour glass inside an hour glass."
That's actually kind of poetic and beautiful, except for the 500,000 grains of sand, er, Seattle residents, trapped inside the inner glass, who may have to escape the "Big One," with time running out. And, unlike Chicago's grid system of NS & EW streets, Seattle has three grids divided into four sections, NE, NW, SE, and SW, because, unlike Lake Michigan, which is generally due east of Chicago, the Puget Sound's Elliott Bay carves an arc on Seattle's western edge, and Lake Washington excises a 25-mile bite out of Seattle's eastern side. (And within lies the downtown with curves like Jane Mansfield.) So for example, as you can see from the map at right, you can live on the corner of 50th Avenue Northeast, & Northeast 50th Street. Your address would correspond. Your address might be 5050 Northeast 50th Street, or 5050 50th Avenue Northeast. But I couldn't live there, not because of the confusing address. But because that's an expensive neighborhood!
2 comments:
Our address numbers in and near Laurelhurst/Windermere can be pretty funny...my Mother's boss at the U of W lived at 4554 45th NE. I grew up on 61st NE just off of NE 60th. If it's a street, the driection is a prefix; if it's an avenue, it's a suffix.
Sorry...I don't know what a driection is...let's say direction instead!
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