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How roads get their names

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-12-11 07:43

The inappropriate names of some roads in cities are largely due to the slack working style of local governments, says an article in the Yangtze Evening Post. The following is an excerpt:

Wuhan Mayor Ruan Cheng has recently criticized the naming of a road in the city. It bears the Chinese name: Huangquan Road, or literally underworld road. As Ruan said, the inappropriate naming of streets must be regulated .

In fact, this road does not get its name officially from the government department concerned. For a long time, the road has no official name at all. People living around gave this road the nickname of Huangquan for it leads to the local funeral home.

It is the government's road naming department that should be held accountable for this inappropriate road name. In recent years, due to the robust growth of Wuhan city, the nicknames of newly paved roads usually become quite popular among the people long before the government's street-naming department gets to know of them.

The department should not sit back in the office, waiting to approve new road names submitted to them; instead, they should take the initiative to go out to streets, naming new roads as soon as they are completed.

(China Daily 12/11/2008 page8)