Until last year this island had eleven named streets and about forty that people described by who lived on them. Every house had a name and no number, and two houses in different parts of the island shared a name in nine cases.
The project named forty three streets, put up one hundred and ninety signs, and gave every household a number. The naming was done in public: a list was proposed at an open meeting, residents objected to nine of them, and seven of those nine objections were accepted.
Why it mattered more than it sounds. The ambulance had been reaching addresses by asking at the corner. A delivery from Male arrived at the harbour with a house name and a family that had moved. Two of the three households that were being missed by the waste round were being missed because the crew had no way to write down which house.
The numbering also gave the office a register that ties a household to a place rather than to a name, which is what made the new waste scheme possible at all. A collection round needs addresses.
Every household was given a printed card with its number on it, and the register is at the counter.
