What is the minimal possible UK address? • Hacker News Board

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#361

Post by TMWNN » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:09 AM UTC

mastax wrote: post #106

I remember CGP Grey talked about staying with his wife's family in rural Hawaii, on his Cortex podcast. His address included something like "take a left at the big tree". The additional complication was that the USPS wouldn't deliver to the house, so they got a PO box, which is common in rural areas. But the USPS won't allow private carriers to deliver to PO boxes. So you need to use a different address depending on…

>The additional complication was that the USPS wouldn't deliver to the house, so they got a PO box, which is common in rural areas. But the USPS won't allow private carriers to deliver to PO boxes. So you need to use a different address depending on which carrier is taking the package. A lot of stores (Amazon!) won't tell you which carrier they're going to use!

Two options:

* Specify both the PO box and street address in the mailing address, like

John Q. Public

PO Box 123

1 Main Street

Anytown USA 00600

This is best for situations where you don't know which carrier the sender will use. People who live in rural areas where they have both a PO box (because USPS won't deliver to their homes) and a valid street address that other carriers do deliver to might use this option.

* USPS PO boxes can receive from other carriers, if street addressing is used. https://www.usps.com/manage/po-boxes.htm#streetaddress>

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#362

Post by Symbiote » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:17 AM UTC

andix wrote: post #96

Austria can top this, there are towns without street names, so the shortest address you could have for example would be (in this example the number is 0, to not post a real address here) 5222 Ach 0 (Which translates to the town of Ach in the ZIP code 5222, and house number 0) If you write it like this it may be even an international valid address (for some countries) A-5222 Ach 0

Britain is still smaller if we can choose an arbitrary address.

S1 1AA

There will be hundreds of complete addresses with this pattern, and many thousands if we add a house number before it.

This is the first I found that is valid. It's the central post office in Sheffield.

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#363

Post by Symbiote » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:19 AM UTC

gumby wrote: post #179

In the UK there are several single-line addresses that would probably work (10 Downing St, His Majesty the King, Blenheim Palace, Chatsworth) but they all use more characters than the example presented. Could the number of characters be reduced?

SW1A 1AA is Buckingham Palace.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SW_postcode_area

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#364

Post by drexlspivey » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:31 AM UTC

jcranmer wrote: post #330

kjs3 wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple of buildings in the US with their own zip code. The White House is one, as is the Empire State building.

The Pentagon manages to have at least 6 zip codes assigned to it (each branch has its own zip code).

It’s mildly annoying that there are 6 branches in The Pentagon

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#365

Post by varenc » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:46 AM UTC

In the US several federal institution have their own zipcodes, no box number required. So they might win the "shortest address" competition on this side of the pond.

For example: 20500 just goes straight to the Whitehouse, 20501 to the Vice President, 20511 to the Director of Intelligence, 20555 is the nuclear regulatory commission, etc.

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#366

Post by throwawaymobule » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:49 AM UTC

benj111 wrote: post #226

seanhunter wrote: post #91

Some brilliant examples of postal detective work in Ireland documented here https://www.quora.com/Can-you-send-mail-in-Ireland-with-the-... . eg Petra Kindler and Donal Moore Unfortunately I forgot the street name but it's near a street named *Cul de Sac* The beautiful city of Waterford, well known for its kindly postmen IRELAND

There was a submission on here a while back with someone using weird addresses etc. One required a cross word to be filled in and it got delivered.

came into the comments to post this, or see if anyone had. couldn't find the URL using the sitewide search.

https://www.meversusanpost.com/

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#367

Post by markmark » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:55 AM UTC

knodi123 wrote: post #260

rax0m wrote: post #88

Olga was a famous doorkeeper at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. Students used to send her postcards from their journeys. It became so popular that it was enough to write "Olga, Sweden" for her to get the letters [0] (source in swedish). [0]: https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olga_Boberg

For her whole life, my grandma would receive any mail sent to her full name and zip code. Since it was a small town and everyone at the post office knew her. Not as impressive as Olga, of course, but close!

My wife grew up in a small town. I met her in university and before the summer break I asked for her address to write to her (this was in the 90s and although I had email by then, she didn't). She assured me that her first name and the town was enough, since all the mail for the town went to the shop across the road from her house and everyone knew her.

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#368

Post by schoen » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 1:56 AM UTC

rax0m wrote: post #88

Olga was a famous doorkeeper at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. Students used to send her postcards from their journeys. It became so popular that it was enough to write "Olga, Sweden" for her to get the letters [0] (source in swedish). [0]: https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olga_Boberg

I mentioned in the other thread about Costa Rican addresses that I met the Vatican priest/Latin grammarian/Latin magazine editor Cleto Pavanetto (https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleto_Pavanetto) around 2008 at a spoken Latin event. (Latin was the only language we had in common!)

He told me that he could get successfully receive mail addressed to

  Cletus
  Vatican

I was pretty impressed!

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#369

Post by suid » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 2:24 AM UTC

There's the old gag about a letter received by the Post Office that it managed to deliver (at least, in the story):

It just said:

   Wood
   John
   Hants

and is supposed to be read as "John Underwood, Andover, Hants"

Re: What is the minimal possible UK address?

#370

Post by User23 » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 2:26 AM UTC

samstave wrote: post #324

kitd wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Duke of Wellington's address, Apsley House, was famously: 1, London Funny story: Back in the 1950s, my father went on a rugby tour to the Soviet Union. One of his team mates wrote a postcard back to his mum with an address of: Mrs Williams, Clynderwen "Clynderwen" being the little village he came from. My dad said, "You can't just put that". He, none too bright, said "Why not? There's only one Clynderwen", and po…

This is the most british-ish written post I have ever read, and now my internal dialog is stuck on the british accent setting. Ill never forget my great aunt amy (my grandmothers sister, they were both canadian by birth in 1923-time) "Grandma, I didnt know Amy was british!?" "Neither did we dear, neither did we" (My great aunt would talk with a British accent) Family fact - my uncle (Amy's son) went to school with Bi…

Back then Canada was still a Dominion of the British Empire so they were British, at least legally. That changed with the Balfour Declaration of 1926.