Where the street has your name...

Jerusalem Municipality makes it easier to immortalize worthy candidates for road recognition.

By MELANIE LIDMAN
Street 311 (photo credit: Courtesy)
Street 311
(photo credit: Courtesy)
Ever dreamed of walking down a road named after… yourself? Jerusalem residents are about to find it easier than ever to present ideas for names of new streets in the capital, after Mayor Nir Barkat launched a section of the municipality website on Tuesday that allows residents to submit requests for street names electronically.
“Choosing names to immortalize personalities on the streets of Jerusalem is not an easy task,” Barkat said. “We’ve worked to make the procedure of memorializing more efficient, and turned it into a more professional, transparent and business-like process.”
Two external committees will examine the naming requests, in accordance with the city’s effort to keep the naming process as free from political influence as possible.
The committees will be headed by retired Supreme Court Justice Jacob Turkel, who has headed the commission investigating the deadly flotilla raid in May, which is concluding shortly. Members of the committee will include Hadassah College President Nava Ben Zvi, and Binyamin Lau, the rabbi of the Ramban synagogue.
Residents have always been allowed to submit ideas for the names of new streets, but the process involved filling out forms and submitting them in-person at the municipality, a time-consuming process few people actually exercised.
With the streamlined process on the Internet, residents can submit naming requests in under five minutes.
“We’re talking about genuinely good news for the citizens who want to present their requests in a process that’s available and accessible to everyone, and enables continual supervision of the requests at every stage through the use of internal file numbers,” said Yifat Oron Shwartz, the director of the branch of the mayor’s office that deals with naming and memorializing.
To submit a name, visit www.jerusalem.muni.il , click on the tab “City and Municipality” and then the button for “Street Names.” The website is only available in Hebrew.