the mysterious NE postcode

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so theres W, SW, SE, E, N, NW but no NE? why?

because theres newcastle right? and they've already got it.

BUT...

in clapton there are a number of streets with, like, 'Brooke Road NE' on them. no number, but clearly an NE postcode, same in hackney...

so there must have been, at one time, a NE. when did this end? and where did it encompass? i'm guessing present day E5, E8, E9, but then what? (E4? E17? E18? E10? E11? N16? N15? N17?)

i know its another typical gareth map question but i'm fascinated as to what happened here

― gareth (gareth), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:20 (twenty-two years ago)

There's no S either (Sheffield stole it).

― Eyeball Kicks (Eyeball Kicks), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:28 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't know why I thought this thread was going to be about Nebraska...

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:31 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah, but there was an NE at some point

― gareth (gareth), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:38 (twenty-two years ago)

If you've got Adobe Acrobat, take a look at this .

― Michael Jones (MichaelJ), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:43 (twenty-two years ago)

also, they go alphabetically in london obviously, except...in SW it gets to the end with SW9 and then starts at the beginning of the alphabet again with SW10. similarly, with SE, it makes sense up until SE18, but then SE19-28 mess things up. how did this happen?

― gareth (gareth), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Gareth, Check Here- London postal district

― DJ Martian (djmartian), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:55 (twenty-two years ago)

yea, martian, but that just explains that they're alphabetical, which is obvious, it doesnt explain why they're not alphabetical in the cases i stated

― gareth (gareth), Thursday, 12 December 2002 21:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh, I once went all into this but I can't be bothered to do it all again now.

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 13 December 2002 09:59 (twenty-two years ago)

NE is newcastle. i used to live in NE40

― Alan (Alan), Friday, 13 December 2002 10:00 (twenty-two years ago)

why not alphabetical - 'cos more surrounding places have become part of London since postcodes started? either that or they've split up districts into smaller sections

― michael (michael), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:15 (twenty-two years ago)

that said, there hasn't been much of an effort to do this. Much of what was (until 1966) Middlesex has kept its old postcodes. Enfield is still EN, Uxbridge UX etc.

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:19 (twenty-two years ago)

what is wrong with us? i understand why sex would be one of the most popular topics on this board, but why is POSTCODES probably the second most hot and popular topic?

(OK, yes, I admit including myself in this.)

― kate (formerly N1 but now EC1), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:33 (twenty-two years ago)

that possible michael, its the only explanation i can think of, although SW10 is no further out than SW6 (unless SW3 was subdivided?)

also, E18, this only makes sense if its 'woodford south' rather than 'south woodford'

and NW11 makes no sense at all - golders green after willesden???

― gareth (gareth), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:34 (twenty-two years ago)

in most american cities, you are what you drive. in london, YOU ARE YOUR POSTCODE.

i think i liked being N1 slightly better than EC1. yes, i know it's a better code and a posher neighbourhood, but i still feel a lot of affection for N1...

NW postcodes made no sense at all. none whatsoever. don't even try to understand.

― kate, Friday, 13 December 2002 12:35 (twenty-two years ago)

EC1 posher than N1? Depends what bits.

Lived in N4 (briefly), EC1, N1 and now N16, and work in EC1. Probably liked N1 the least but only cos of the particular place we were living. Plenty happy now in N16.

Kate, I share your lack of NW comprehension. But then I don't do W either.

― James Ball (James Ball), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:44 (twenty-two years ago)

nw1 camden
nw2 cricklewood
nw3 hampstead
nw4 hendon
nw5 kentish town
nw6 kilburn
nw7 mill hill
nw8 st johns wood
nw9 west hendon
nw10 willesden
nw11 golders green????

it makes TOTAL sense! until the last one

― gareth (gareth), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:52 (twenty-two years ago)

clerkenwell = way posher than hoxton (and i mean street, not square. square is quite posh, but i lived up in the nasty, horrible council estate bit of hoxton.)

i lived in NW6 for three years. when i went across the road, i was in NW3. i did not live in kilburn, i lived in swiss cottage. man, 20 yards between me and a hampstead postcode. no fair.

― kate, Friday, 13 December 2002 12:53 (twenty-two years ago)

It's not that there's no logic in the numbering Gareth, just that I don't know my way round the place. If somebody said NW8 to me it wouldn't mean anything.

― James Ball (James Ball), Friday, 13 December 2002 12:55 (twenty-two years ago)

i lived in Shepherds Bush for a bit except it was cunningly referred to as West Kensington, as the W14 postcode for my road dictated, heh

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 13 December 2002 14:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I live in W14 now, though my flat is only five minutes walk from Shepherd's Bush Green.

― RickyT (RickyT), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:17 (twenty-two years ago)

we are the postal carriers who say "NE"!!

― ron (ron), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Amazingly, I was just going to post "Because the Royal Mail couldn't face all the crap Monty Python jokes".

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:42 (twenty-two years ago)

:`(

― ron (ron), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:48 (twenty-two years ago)

;-)

― ron (ron), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:51 (twenty-two years ago)

to stop you all being so sad (I have enough of postal enthusiasts at work, it's not personal) here's a link to our info sheet at work.

there was an NE postcode in the 19th century, but in 1866 Anthony Trollope, who worked for the post office, reported that NE wasn't considered viable, and it was dropped. so NE lasted less than 10 years.
http://www.royalmailgroup.com/heritage/downloads/infosheet_4.pdf

― Vicky (Vicky), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah yes - I remember now

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 13 December 2002 15:58 (twenty-two years ago)

England has no Nebraska?

― donut bitch (donut), Friday, 13 December 2002 18:44 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw her standing on her front lawn

― the pinefox, Friday, 13 December 2002 21:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, we have no Nebraska

― RickyT (RickyT), Saturday, 14 December 2002 01:45 (twenty-two years ago)

The two things puzzling Gareth could be related - perhaps the absorption of NE and S into their near-neighbours meant a whole set of districts appended to the existing postcode series, SE20 onwards, for example, were lower-numbered S districts at some point.

But, I've just realised, that's bollocks cos there weren't any numbers before 1917 and the dissolution of S and NE occurred before that. Oh, well.

SE19 does make sense, btw: Xstl Palys.

― Michael Jones (MichaelJ), Saturday, 14 December 2002 12:23 (twenty-two years ago)

five months pass...

why is golders green nw11, despite the fact that alphabetically it is after nw10 willesden?

was it once split between hendon and hampstead, and when they introduce the new one they just tacked it on the end?

― gareth (gareth), Tuesday, 20 May 2003 10:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Search me, Gareth - you could also call NW11 'Temple Fortune' and be correct but that doesn't scan either.

― suzy (suzy), Tuesday, 20 May 2003 11:11 (twenty-two years ago)

In the SW area, did SW20 come into existence as a spillover from the burgeoning SW19? Raynes Park doesn't come before Wimbledon in anyone's book, and even when it's called West Wimbledon (albeit mainly by estate agents) it's still the wrong way round. So could the non-sequential postcodes be simple add-ons as the populations covered by the extant codes became too full?

― Mark C (Mark C), Tuesday, 20 May 2003 11:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Mark: it seems so.

http://216.239.33.100/search?q=cache:WShwjpSqa2YC:rlab.lse.ac.uk/DataService/downloads/londonpostcodes.doc+London+postal+districts+map&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Interesting that SE and SW seem to have second little alphabetical runs, with Crystal Palace and South Wimbledon (Raynes Park) sitting lonely at SE19 and SW20 respectively.

― Tim (Tim), Tuesday, 20 May 2003 11:33 (twenty-two years ago)

two years pass...

hello, im new here. does anyone know when the postcode of NW11 came into being, and if it came into being at a later date than NW1-10?

― terry lennox. (gareth), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:28 (nineteen years ago)

This is explained in the Wiki link above -

Note: NW11 (Golders Green) seems to be out of the usual alphabetical order, possibly because its post office was referred to as Willifield Green, which would come alphabetically after Willesden.

― Colonel Poo (Colonel Poo), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:54 (nineteen years ago)

Maybe now that the Royal Mail Archive has been Designated as an Outstanding Collection by the Museums Libraries and Archives Council you'll come to our lovely searchroom and find out lots of fascinating post code facts?

― Vicky (Vicky), Friday, 28 October 2005 09:13 (nineteen years ago)

oh, i didnt see that willifield green bit!

― terry lennox. (gareth), Friday, 28 October 2005 09:56 (nineteen years ago)

hello, im new here.

Mmm. Not convinced.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Friday, 28 October 2005 10:01 (nineteen years ago)

Not Convinced 1

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 28 October 2005 10:06 (nineteen years ago)

NW11 is my old postcode!

― knife (nordicskilla), Friday, 28 October 2005 15:21 (nineteen years ago)

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