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 About the State Government's Rural Addressing Project The benefits of a rural address Supporters Rural Addressing Background The Importance of an Address The Responsibility for Addressing The Advent of Rural Addressing Australian & New Zealand Standard for Rural Addressing The Components of a Rural Address Rural Road Numbering - How Does it Work? What is a “Rural Occupied Property”? About the State Government’s Rural Addressing Project The Rural Addressing Project was a State Government initiative to accurately number rural properties in Victoria. The Department of Sustainability and Environment worked in partnership with local governments to name roads, allocate rural road numbers and clearly number property entrances. The aim of the project was to give every rural occupied property a unique address, making it easy to identify and locate. In the life of the project October 2001 to June 2005, over 60,000 rural occupied properties were allocated a rural road number. Apart from the Rural City of Mildura, all local governments completed rural addressing in 2005. Rural addressing was only considered complete when:
The benefits of a rural address Rural road numbers benefit residents and rural communities in a number of ways:
Supporters The Rural Addressing Project is enthusiastically supported by the following organisations: Rural Ambulance Victoria "Even a few minutes delay in an ambulance finding a property can make the difference between life and death." John McKenzie, Station Officer, Rural Ambulance Victoria – Camperdown State Emergency Services“During a major disaster the person responding to your call for help may not be a local. Being able to quickly and easily locate your property could make a huge difference to how you are affected by the disaster.” Jacky Thorn, SES Controller Gisborne Victorian Local Governance Association "Rural Addressing will help to make local government services to properties easier, more efficient and more responsive as well as providing for better postal and emergency services responsiveness." Mike Hill, Secretary, Victorian Local Governance Association Country Women’s Association “The Country Women's Association of Victoria Inc. endorses the Rural Addressing Project. When totally implemented, this project will allow accurate identification of properties for the benefit of all services.” Joy Weller, State President, The Country Women's Association of Victoria Inc. Australia Post “After mailers adopt Rural Road Numbers, Australia Post will be better able to provide reliable and efficient mail services to rural Australia.” Jim Marshall, General Manager, Mail & Networks Division, Australia Post Victoria Police “This initiative will greatly assist the police to improve the level of community safety in rural areas. Our members will now be able to provide quicker response times to those people most in need of police assistance.” Superintendent Danny Tuck, Police Divisional Office, Bairnsdale Country Fire Authority"The new rural addressing system is a great relief and is the best way to find a property in an emergency, its easy to understand and we get there much quicker," Captain John Glazzard, Tynong Rural Fire Brigade Telstra Country Wide“Accurate addressing helps Telstra Country Wide and our service staff deliver on our commitment to better customer service.” Rural Addressing Background The Importance of an Address Rural properties can be difficult to locate without an easily understood addressing system. Many people have experienced the frustration of trying to find an unfamiliar rural property. Relying on directions such as ‘look out for the place with the red roof …about two and bit kilometres down the road …second turn on the left’ can be confusing. This frustration is also shared by emergency services, utilities and delivery and pick up services. In an emergency, every second counts. A delay in dispatching or arrival of emergency services because of an ambiguous address could mean the difference between life and death. The Responsibility for Addressing Under the Local Government Act 1989 – Schedule 10. Clause 5, Councils hold power in relation to “nam[ing] roads, erection of signs and the numbering of premises”. In the past, there were no rules or guidelines to follow in exercising these powers in rural areas. Residents and authorities were forced to adopt various non-standard methods of addressing. The Advent of Rural Addressing The late Mr Noel Edgerton, of the former Shire of Corio first introduced rural addressing in Victoria in 1986. Working in Corio’s Rates Office, Noel was familiar with the problems of inadequate addressing conventions and not being able to locate rural properties. Noel devised a system where rural address numbers were allocated to properties in a logical sequence, based on the distance of the property’s main entrance from the nominated start of a road. The distance-based system was easily understood and benefited all users, particularly emergency and utility services. The system was also sufficiently flexible to handle future subdivisions. Other councils began to redress their rural addressing problems by adopting the Corio model however implementation of the model was not uniform - standards and guidelines were needed. Australian & New Zealand Standard for Rural Addressing In the early 1990's the Australia New Zealand Land Information Council (ANZLIC) formed a working group on Rural Street Addressing. Comprised of delegates from each Australian state and territory and a delegate from New Zealand, the group developed guidelines known as the ANZLIC Guidelines for the Systematic Addressing of Rural Properties. In the late 1990's, these guidelines were subsequently reviewed and published by Standards Australia as the Australian/New Zealand Standard, AS/NZS 4724:2000 Geographic Information – Rural Addressing . Following further research into the application of street addressing across Australia and New Zealand by a working group of the Intergovernmental Committee on Survey and Mapping (ICSM), a new Australian/New Zealand Standard, Geographic Information – Rural & Urban Addressing(AS/NZS 4819:2003) was released. This standard as its title implies covers all aspects of addressing applications, both rural and urban. The Components of a Rural Address A rural address has three key elements: a Rural Road Number, a Road Name and a Locality. Eg: 35 Browns Road, Axedale. Rural Road Number Rural road numbers (RRN) are based on the distance of the main property entrance from the start of the road. This is the primary address of the property. RRN’s may also be allocated to other entrances to the property (ie access points to shearing or milking sheds) but these are considered secondary addresses. Road Name In order to implement the rural addressing system, councils must ensure that all roads with occupied properties are named. During this naming process, many councils will review duplicate or confusing road names. Ideally, each road name should be unique within a rural district and preferably within the municipality. Roads are named or renamed by the council following a public consultation process. Signposting of newly named roads should occur shortly afterwards. Locality The locality makes a rural address unique, immediately indicating where in Victoria an address is situated. Localities and rural districts were officially named and defined by councils between 1998 and 2000 as part of the locality definition project under the Geographic Place Names Act 1998. A complete list of registered localities can be found online at www.land.vic.gov.au/vicnames or at your local council office. Rural Road Numbering - How Does it Work? Rural road numbering is a permanent and easy-to-follow way of identifying and locating properties in a logical sequence along any road in rural areas. Rural road numbers are similar to the street number used in urban areas, the only difference being that rural road numbers are determined by the distance of the main property entrance from the start of the road. Rural road numbers (RRN’s) are calculated by dividing the distance in metres from the start of the road by 10 and rounding down to an odd (for properties on the left) or even number (for properties on the right) as required. For example, a property entrance 930m from the start of the road and situated on the left-hand side of the road would be number 93. If the property entrance was on the right-hand side of the road, then the rural road number would be 92. For the system to work effectively, rural road numbers need to be clearly displayed at the property entrance. What is a “Rural Occupied Property”? The scope of the current Rural Addressing Project is to address all “rural occupied properties” although some councils have decided to number all properties. For the purposes of the Rural Addressing Project, the term “rural occupied property” refers to a parcel or parcels of land that make up a single Council assessment, or a single area of management in the case of Crown Land where there is some form of habitation. There are advantages in addressing all properties and significant property areas such as milk sheds, machinery sheds and stockyards. At this time however, funding for the Rural Addressing Project is limited to addressing rural occupied properties only. Councils considered the following factors when determining rural occupied properties for rural addressing.
The following table is the definitive list of what are considered rural occupied properties under the Rural Addressing Project.
Contents Further information For information about when rural addressing will happen in your area, contact your local council. Your local council will notify you of your new rural road number and when to start using it. If you have any concerns about the use of rural road numbering for mail delivery, please contact your local post office or the Australia Post Customer Contact Centre on 13 13 18. For general enquiries about rural addressing e-mail rural.roadnumbers@dse.vic.gov.au. This document was last reviewed on 7/03/2007.
© 2007 by the State of Victoria
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