clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Geniuses at Billy Penn Help Us Remember Order of Streets

New, 2 comments

We all were once new here. And we all had a method of remembering the order of Center City streets (maybe some of us invented a handy little rap, just as an example). Our friends over at Billy Penn shared a question posed on Philly Reddit a month ago:

"Is there an easy way to remember the order of East-West [directional] streets in different parts of the city? Like an anagram our sentence that they all spell out?" user TeeHomes asked. "I seem to have a severe mental block on remembering them." It's not just you, TeeHomes. You're just one of the few brave enough to admit it.

Reddit user bierdimpfe was quick with a reply:

"A Man Could Simply Wander, Looking (at) Street-signs (to) Properly Learn (the) Streets."

Slow clap.

Billy Penn designer extraordinaire Jayna Wallace turned it into a graphic, and the rest is history. Seriously, this should be printed out and plastered all over the walls of the Independence Visitor Center. Two thumbs up, Billy Penn. Two thumbs up.

Incidentally, this is not the only useful mnemonic device we've come across to assist both the new and memory-challenged alike remember the order of Philly streets (there are a few theories as to why the majority of Center City streets are named after trees). Philly Trees, for example, offers this little ditty:

My Cat Wears Lucky Snow Pants Low Slung

Any graphic designers out there want to tackle that one?

· 'A man could simply wander:' this handy mnemonic orders Center City streets, North to South [Billy Penn]
· Philadelphia Streets [Philly Trees]
· Greene Countrie Town Full of Streets Named After Trees [Curbed Philly]