Another Unleashed By Petco store closing

In Boston's urban renewal era, the 1960s and '70s, the city regularly used the prefix "New " on a relocated or extended street that took the name of an older thoroughfare. Hence, for example, New Sudbury Street, New Chardon Street, and New Congress Street in the Government Center area. Eventually, many of those "News" were dropped as people forgot that there once had been an earlier street using the same name.

New Edgerly Road is an example. Edgerly Road originally started at Haviland St., proceeded south parallel to Mass. Ave., then made about a 45 degree angle and followed what Google Maps now calls Bickerstaff Street, ending at Burbank Street. It never got to Westland Avenue.

When the Church Park Apartments building was erected on Mass. Ave. as part of the Fenway urban renewal project, a new street -- called New Edgerly Road -- was laid out behind the apartment building, all the way to Westland Avenue. It looks like a good chunk of the old Edgerly was turned into a pedestrian way and apparently renamed Bickerstaff at some point, probably as part of the urban renewal plans, but I don't know exactly when/how.

Eventually, as people started forgetting that the old Edgerly had once existed, the "New" got dropped from "New Edgerly" and the entire street parallel to Mass. Ave., as far as Westland, was just called "Edgerly Road". I'm not sure when/if this decision was made officially, one would have to check the city records for that.

Yes, Google Maps does show that one segment near Westland -- the segment that's perpendicular to the rest of Edgerly -- as "New Edgerly Road". I've learned NEVER to trust Google, or Bing, or GPS, or any other online source, to be the true arbiter of official street names in things like this. All those online sites get crowdsourced and edited by algorithms and by computer scientists in Silicon Valley, and you can come up with just about any place name you want. Remember that funny community name that they once put in the middle of Franklin Park? The one that no one in greater Boston had ever heard of?

I'm not sure where you can go for accurate info about Boston street names these days, other than going in person to the BRA/BPDA office, but I wouldn't trust Google.

the original terminus of Edgerly Road was the little stub of a street off Burbank Street that abuts the recently redone Symphony Park in front of Morville House. So I assume New Edgerly Road denoted the stretch from the back of church Park to Westland Avenue. The address of the independent living center I used to go to for services was 50 New Edgerly Road. I think it is dentists now or may be a gym. And I assume the road was created when Church Park was built in the early 1970s. Or maybe it was when "Symphony Park" was created?

about whether it's Edge-Er-Ly or Edgar-Ly.

Where does one go for the "correct" pronunciation of a street name, anyway? In Roxbury we have Guild St, which a number of long-time residents pronounce "Guy-Old." (A similarly sizeable group of long-time residents express incredulity that anyone would possibly think you pronounce a street bearing the name of a standard noun in any way other than the usual pronunciation of that noun).