Agenda item

Street Naming and Numbering - Charges

Decision:

The Policy & Performance Portfolio Holder,

 

(a)               APPROVED the draft Address Management Policy, subject to the changes agreed at the meeting, and

(b)               AGREED the charges for Street Naming and Numbering, subject to the changes agreed at the meeting for adoption by the Council with effect from 1 April 2011.

Minutes:

Paul Grainger, GIS and Information Manager was in attendance for this item.

 

The Portfolio Holder considered the proposed fee payment structure for street naming and numbering, which would enable the recovery of some of the costs of providing the service.

 

·                 Graphs were circulated by the Portfolio Holder to Cllr Lynda Harford who was present at the meeting, which showed the comparable costs of the local authorities named in Appendix 2 to the policy, together with his suggested charges. The Portfolio Holder’s proposed changes to the scale of charges reduced the number of steps required for the number of plots/proposed fee ratio

·                 The Principal Accountant informed the Portfolio Holder that any comparison with other authorities needed to be treated with a degree of caution as they had a higher number of overheads compared with SCDC

·               The Head of ICT informed the Portfolio Holder that the proposed charge for additional plots over 101 should have read £10 and not £5 as shown in the table at para 12 of the report

·               Senior Management Team had endorsed the proposed scale of charges

·               The charges would be subject to a 6-month review

·               Cllr Lynda Harford agreed with the officer’s recommendation and to err on the side of caution in case of the possibility of the proposed charges being challenged

 

The Policy & Performance Portfolio Holder, having considered the options,

 

(i)                  AGREED the charges for Street Naming and Numbering, as set out in the table at para 12 of the report, subject to an amendment of the wording `Naming a new or re-naming an existing property’ to `Re-naming an existing property and the charge for Re-naming an existing property to be amended from £50 per dwelling to £30 per dwelling. The charges to become effective from 1 April 2011.

 

Copies of amendments made to the Address Management Policy by the Portfolio Holder were circulated for consideration. As a result of the ensuing discussion, the following changes to the Policy were made:

 

(a)        Para 2.1 – insert the following paragraph after the first set of bullet points:

 

`Any new naming and numbering scheme shall be as simple and clear as possible, to enable emergency vehicles to rapidly locate any house, and to prevent visitors from becoming disoriented or lost.’

 

(b)        Para 2.1- replace the third bullet point within the second set of bullet points with the following:

 

`Streets may occasionally be named after people. It would be preferable not to do so unless the person whose name has been suggested is in some way related to the particular area or village where the development is taking place and is deceased.  A street must never be named using both parts of a person’s name (this may cause confusion to an emergency operator between a patient’s name and an address). With the exception of saints or members of a royal family, the surname alone is to be used.

 

(c)               Para 2.1 – add the following text to the end of the first bullet point in the 3rd set of bullet points:

`Unless otherwise specified, the settlement centre shall be taken to be the parish Church.’

 

(d)               Para 2.1 – Replace the 4th bullet point in the 3rd set of bullet points with the following:

 

`No exception to the logical numbering pattern will be allowed, to ensure the maintenance of a proper sequence’.

 

(e)               Para 2.1 – insert a new bullet point after the 5th bullet point in the 3rd set of bullet points with the following text:

 

`A new street with a single name shall not require a person walking down its full length to have to make a decision about which part of the street to walk down next. (In technical terms, that is to say that a street shall contain no bifurcations.) An exception may be made for a short spur’.

 

(f)                 Para 2.1 – insert additional text at the end of bullet point 7 in the 3rd set of bullet points with the following:

 

`(Some properties may be named rather than numbered – see Section 2.5.)’

 

(g)               Para 2.1 - insert additional text at the end of bullet point 8 in the 3rd set of bullet points with the following:

 

`and in easily visible colour combinations.’

 

(h)        Para 2.4, 4th line down, the addition of the word `we’ between and and would

 

(i)                  Para 2.5, third sentence in the second paragraph be amended to read:

 

`The property number must always be displayed on the property so that it is visible from the highway and used to summon emergency services. Householders may use a name as well as a number as their official address in correspondence.’

 

(j)                  Para 3, amend the last sentence to read:

 

`To confirm a postcode, contact Royal Mail at’

 

(k)                Para 4. Charges – replace the table of charges with those agreed in the recommendation above at para 39 (i) and add the following text immediately underneath the table:

 

`The charge for street renaming may be waived at the discretion of the Council if the request is made or endorsed by the emergency services, or if the existing naming or numbering scheme is considered to be confusing or illogical.’

 

(l)      Para 7 – first paragraph – replace the word continually with the word continuously’

 

The Policy & Performance Portfolio Holder,

 

(ii)            APPROVED the draft Address Management Policy, subject to the changes stated above.

Supporting documents: