Introduction
This forms part of UK Editing Best Practice. Editors are encouraged to follow these guidelines.
As there is only a single field in Waze to label a road with its city it is important to ensure that we apply a consistant scope to the naming of these. For instance Greater London contains many towns, and labelling every road as being in London would lead to confusion when searching for an address.
For discussion on the topic see:
City and County Naming
The City field in Waze should be completed in the format "town (county)"
Examples 1. "Ware (Herts)" 2. "Islington (London)".
The definition of the town will depend on your local area.
Exceptions: For major towns and cities that are either uniquely named, or commonly recognised by its name, then the suffix is not required. For example: Birmingham, Leeds, Newcastle and Preston. Only the smaller towns that share the same name will need to be distinguished. e.g. Preston (Dorset) or Leeds (Kent). The suffix can also be dropped from small towns and villages with long unique names, such as Thorpe Willoughby and Burton upon Trent.
City Suburbs
For very large cities with suburbs, then the suburb should become the name of the town with the city name as the suffix. This is particularly important for generating useful the traffic reports, especially when there are long arterial or ring roads that go through several parts of the city.
Examples 1. "Colton (Leeds)" 2. "Old Trafford (Manchester)" 3. "Kingswood (Bristol)"
County Abbreviations
The following abbreviations should be used for UK Counties:
- Beds
- Berks
- Bucks
- Cambs
- Cheshire
- Cleveland
- Cornwall
- Co Durham
- Cumbria
- Derbs
- Devon
- Dorset
- E Sussex
- Essex
- Glos
- Hants
- Herefs
- Herts
- IOW
- Kent
- Lancs
- Leics
- Lincs
- London
- Manchester
- Merseyside
- Middx
- Norfolk
- N Lincs
- N Yorks
- NE Lincs
- Northants
- Northd
- Notts
- Oxon
- Rutland
- Shrops
- Somerset
- S Yorks
- Staffs
- Suffolk
- Surrey
- Tyne & Wear
- Warks
- W Mids
- W Sussex
- W Yorks
- Wilts
- Worcs
Postal Vs. Actual Addresses
In some areas the postal address does not match the county. This happens frequently in parts of London, e.g. "Enfield (Middx)", "Bromley (Kent)", "Hornchurch (Essex)" which are all part of Greater London and some are Unitary Authorities and so in effect are their own "County".
In these cases the postal address should be used, so "Bromley (Kent)" as opposed to "Bromley (London)".
A possible exception is Middlesex which is no longer a county but some towns still retain their postal addresses. See UK City Names Forum Topic for discussion.