About a month ago in a post called “Street Name Game in Sacramento” I talked about how some streets have one name and then all of a sudden the name changes to become a completely different street.  This can be a little confusing until you finally stop questioning it and just accept it as a fact of Sacramento life.  But today I discovered a street that topped all the other crazy street names I have previously encountered in Sacramento, or any other city for that matter.

Just off of Riverside Drive close to William Land Park, where you will find not only a park, but a golf course and the Sacramento Zoo, there’s a street called Teneighth Way.  Using a grid for naming streets works great most of the time, until it doesn’t.  Teneighth Way is certainly one of those times when someone started on each edge and just didn’t quite meet in the middle.  There’s a couple of places where 6th Avenue meets 7th avenue, and 7th Avenue meets 8th Avenue, (and I think all these streets are supposed to be parallel instead of meeting each other), but then the engineers just gave up the fight.  There are a few blocks where 8th Avenue curves around and directly meets 10th Avenue.  So what do you call those few blocks where the two streets intertwine, Teneighth Way of course.  Oh yes, what happened to 9th Avenue in all these wandering streets.  Don’t worry it’s there too, just past Teneighth Way between 8th and 10th Avenues where it belongs. 

I’m sure you’re probably confused by now about these crazy street names, because I know I was, and I was there.  I think it is just one of those quirky things that makes you love the place you live, even though it’s not perfect it’s yours.  Kind of like your crazy Aunt Mildred who bakes all that zucchini bread that’s hard as a rock and gives it to everyone at Christmas.  We haven’t eaten it yet, but we tell her every year how good it is, just because we love her even though she is a little quirky.

Click on this link for a map of Teneighth Way so you will be able to find one of Sacramento’s little quirks that makes it special.  teneighth-way-map