Have you been to the 'Athens of the North' or had some days off on the 'English Riviera' ? Why not meet in 'town' in 'Chippy Alley'? We often use informal place names in everyday conversation to describe a location or to give directions on how to get somewhere. Not so with public information systems which require administrative place names to successfully associate search queries with Edinburgh, Torbay and Cardiff, Caroline Street (our examples above). Our research is an effort to collect and represent informal place names to improve information systems that are currently only based on administrative place names.

The aim of People's Place Names is to collect place names as used in everyday communication. Currently these names are not available to search engines and digital mapping services. Maps with your place names can improve the response time of ambulances, or help to find a restaurant in an unknown 'city centre'.