By VINAYA SAKSENA

CUMBERLAND — The addresses of 10 local households have been changed through a vote of the Town Council at its meeting Wednesday night.

Following a presentation by Gregg Noury, acting director of the town’s Rescue Department, the council voted unanimously to approve the renaming of a stretch of road from Barway Lane to Valley Stream Drive. According to Noury, the decision ends years of confusion regarding the matter.
Valley Stream Drive as it stands today resulted from a development project by the Geddes Builders company that was started 11 years ago. According to Noury, the company had intended to develop a curving stretch of road that would connect Valley Stream drive to Barway Lane, which parallels the main stretch of Valley Stream Drive.
The Planning Department approved a plan from Geddes for a 23-lot subdivision on the two roads in March 1997. Shortly thereafter, however, the department received letters from Fire Chief Harold Audette and Rescue Service Director Paul Crawford expressing concern about the decision.
At issue was the developer’s intention to finish the project in phases. Both expressed opposition to this idea, with Audette saying in his letter that the plan submitted to his department for the street “did not mention phasing.” He recommended that a new stretch of road connected to Barway Lane also retain that name until Valley Stream Drive could be connected to it.
Noury explained that the phase of the project that entailed connecting the two streets had encountered some obstacles, the exact nature of which he did not specify.
As a result, he said, that phase of the project had been skipped. He said that the intention had been for the stretch of road in question to retain the name Barway Lane for the time being, to be changed to Valley Stream Drive once the project was completed.
Noury pointed out that the change would affect the street name for 10 addresses, but not the house numbers.He told the council he had reached residents of seven of the 10 properties, and that no objections had been raised to the change.
The ordinance passed by the council specified that the rescue director would be responsible for notifying the affected public safety departments of the change.