The idea that the default address should be an ordered number on a street is recent — still within living memory (e.g. my grandmother in Australia refused to go along with it when it was introduced and “required” there and continued to provide the name of her house, despite what the post office said – – and her letters still arrived).

It’s actually rather sad to me that the roads have become the default and the space between the road is the “other“. Roads and paths used cut through the former default which was land. In fact the roads had the names because they were the rarest thing. But of course, starting with cities, our mental maps must have started to flip.

If you spend a lot of time backpacking or hiking you start to get back the idea that the path cuts through the land rather than the land being what lies between he roads.

This is another area where I believe self driving cars will be a win: the very idea of roads may become less significant.