Also interesting; looking at Gore's directory for 1900, that property doesn't exist, nor does the road between Borough Rd. and The Woodlands. Also, that length of road, on the attached map, has pavements,(dotted lines) like Borough Rd., but none of the other roads in the area do. The map is from 1912, so that road was built, together with 177 Borough Rd., between 1900 & 1912. Road now has an 'm' at each end on the map. I can't find a name for that road on any of the maps I have. Maybe it was just assumed to be a continuation of Fearnley Rd., but that is numbered from The Woodlands to Lowwood Rd. in Gore's directory.
On a large scale map from the 50's, the house standing behind Lewis's, at the end of the entry, is No.3, but no road name is given. The houses on the east side of Fearnley Road (as shown on the map)towards Lowwood Road are odd numbered in their 20's. The spacing between the two groups of houses could leave room for concurrent numbering up Fearnley Road, from Borough Road, should houses ever be built there. As you say, it is a logical assumption to regard this as Fearnley Road.
There must have been some re-numbering at some time. Here's the extract from Gore's 1900 directory, which corresponds perfectly with the 1912 map. Incidentally, the large building between The Woodlands and No.1 Fearnley is the Y.W.C.A. and its address is 42 The Woodlands.
Perhaps Fearnley Road was numbered in relation to the centre of Tranmere, and renumbered sometime after 1912 in relation to Birkenhead Town Hall. Chriskay - can you confirm this with other streets that lie in the same direction on your 1912 map, within the Tranmere boundary? It would be interesting to find out. On my 1954 map, the terrace of houses on the south west side number 18 to 36 (18 being nearest Woodlands) with the terrace of five houses on the south east side being 23 to 29. 42A The Woodlands is on the corner of Fearnley, the big house to the east of the YWCA is numbered 44, so as you say, this makes the YWCA to be number 42. As to the numbering of Borough Road - well, we already know that 177 was at the bottom of Fearnley Road, the Library lies between 329 and 367. No. 250 lay on the corner of (little) Wheatstone Lane, near Tempus Fugit, the watch shop, while 382 was next to the school at the bottom of Mount Grove. This is exactly the way you and I expect it to be - low numbers nearest the Town Hall, odds on the left, evens on the right when the TH is behind you, and that is the way it is numbered.
Fearnley Rd.was numbered from The Woodlands to Lowwood Rd., see map. This from Gore's 1900. The numbering was obviously changed at some time before your 1954 map. The short section of road from Borough Rd. to The Woodlands doesn't appear in Gore's 1900, so I guess didn't exist then. The Woodlands was numbered from Whetstone Lane (although I'm surprised it wasn't numbered from Clifton Rd). Hollybank Rd. & Lowwood Rd. numbered from Clifton Rd. Cedar St. & Maple St. numbered from Hollybank Rd. This from Gore's 1900. I only have one map with numbering on & I can't find it!! I agree with you, Norton, as to the numbering method; low numbers nearest Town Hall & odd numbers on the left, evens on the right. Smaller roads numbering from the nearest major road, and so on. Don't agree with your interpretation, DD.
Thanks for that. The only other reason that I can think of for it to be un-named and un-numbered is that at sometime it was a private lane or unadopted passage. Possibly it began as a shortcut from the school or Fearnley Hall and into the Happy Valley or Borough Road. As to 40A v 42A, I think it tends to be a case of who got to use the whole number first. A lot of the numbering must have been a guestimate as to the number of houses that could be built between two roads where no continious stretch of buildings exsisted - hence the gaps in numbering and the occasional suffix lettters.
