Nameless Queens

Who's counting?

A new news and phone cards store--just what we needed--opened on Roosevelt Avenue just steps from the BTB Research Bureau. Why "84" when it appears to be on the corner of Roosevelt Ave. and 85th St. (Woody Guthrie Street)? I say "appears" because it's actually on the corner of Roosevelt and Forley Street.

Roosevelt is the border between the gridlines of Jackson Heights' numbered streets, avenues, and occasional roads, and the quaint named streets and avenues of Elmhurst: Forley, Britton, Gleane, Ithaca, etc. Take a look at the lower right-hand corner of the topographic map below. You can see everything bends to the east or west after it crosses Roosevelt Ave. Elmhurst Avenue makes a bold attempt to maintain its name after it crosses Roosevelt Avenue but within a few blocks it is pacified by 37th Avenue. As Polish poet Stanisław Grochowiak wrote, "To the promised land of statistics."