Good street names sound lived in: a local name and the right ending, like Rothwell Close for a quiet cul-de-sac or Vernon Mews for a row of converted stables. Every map needs streets, and every street needs a name that sounds lived in. This street name generator makes British closes, crescents and wynds, American drives and boulevards, crooked fantasy alleys for your D&D city, rain-soaked cyberpunk skyways and some gloriously silly roads.
Eight good street names
All eight came from the generator, across its five styles:
- Vernon Mews: a sweep of Georgian houses, with the mews that once meant stables.
- Rothwell Close: a quiet British cul-de-sac.
- Hidden Brook Circle: an American suburb named after the stream they built over.
- Ellery Street: an old American main drag with a diner and a hardware store.
- Candlemakers' Alley: a fantasy street named after its trade, the way medieval streets were.
- Weathercock Wynd: a wynd is a narrow Scottish lane, which suits a fantasy old town.
- Wetware Spur: a cyberpunk street that leads down into the cargo docks.
- Twitching Curtain Terrace: a funny name for a street where everyone knows everyone's business.
How real streets got their names
Old street names are practical. They say where the road goes, what was sold there or who lived on it:
- High Street was the main street of a town, "high" meaning important rather than uphill.
- Gate in York comes from the Old Norse gata, a street: Stonegate, Coppergate and Micklegate are streets, and the city's actual gateways are called bars.
- The Shambles, also in York, is named after the benches butchers sold meat from. Pudding Lane in London, where the Great Fire of 1666 began, is said to be named after the offal, or "puddings", carted along it.
- Trades gave streets their names all over Europe, which is why the fantasy style has Tilers' Passage and Apothecaries' Row.
The ending says what kind of street it is. A close is usually a cul-de-sac, a mews was a row of stables behind grand houses, a terrace is a row of joined houses, a row a line of cottages, and a wynd a narrow Scottish lane. American cities went another way: the 1811 plan for Manhattan laid out numbered streets and avenues, which is why the American style has East 93rd Street.
Choose With a description to give each street a detail, like Medlar Grove, lined with tiny Victorian cottages and cobbles.
Using street names
- In a story or game, name the streets players will walk down, and let the rest be "the market" or "the docks".
- Give each district a flavour: trade names near the market, grand mews by the palace, wynds and steps in the old town.
- For a real development, UK street names are approved by the local council, usually after the developer has suggested them. Councils avoid names that are already used nearby.
For the districts the streets run through, try the Fantasy District Name Generator. For the place itself, there's the Fantasy City, Fantasy Town and Village name generators, and for the house at number seven, the House Name Generator.
For more, see all the place name generators.