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Fun fact: there's actually an Ontario, Oregon.
by davidw 7y ago
Fun fact: there's actually an Ontario, Oregon.
- Waterluvian 7y agoThere's also an Ontario California. So Ontario, CA and Ontario Canada. Sigh naming things is hard.
- kryogen1c 7y agoAnd you thought refactoring a code base was hard
- benj111 7y agoTo be fair most places in North America seem to be named after European places, possibly with a 'new' prefix. So I don't think it's fair to single out Ontario here.
- davidw 7y agoNot in this case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario#Etymology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario#Etymology However, it'd be fascinating to see some mapping showing in detail where most place names are from in a region. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_and_territory_name_etymologies_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_and_territory_na... has the states, but it'd be more fun to dive into towns, rivers, mountains, etc...
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mehrdadn 7y agoWhat sucks about this one is it's too easy to get a cheap flight to Ontario, CA thinking it was a bargain, not realizing you're not going where you thought you're going...
- Scoundreller 7y agoThere's a few stories of people buying tickets to Sydney NS (Nova Scotia Canada), instead of their desired Sydney NSW, and landing much earlier than expected.
- mehrdadn 7y agoOuch!
- astrodust 7y agoWhen you're from Ontario and say you're from Ontario in California, people think they know what you're talking about, but they don't.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoOne of the worst offenders has to be Newark, NJ and New York, NY. How confusing is it for an international traveler, especially considering how international the area is! On top of that, a major train station in NYC is New York Penn Station, and a major train station in NJ is Newark Penn Station. Someone can land at Newark Airport, and have to figure out the difference between going to Newark Penn Station or New York Penn Station, which are in opposite directions from the airport.
- alexhutcheson 7y ago> between going to Newark Penn Station or New York Penn Station, which are in opposite directions from the airport. They're in the same direction from the airport, and the train will stop in Newark Penn on the way to New York Penn. Some people will be confused and try to get off in Newark, although the conductors normally try to announce this really clearly.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoOops, my bad! I was thinking of going from Secaucus station, another big NJ train station, from which they are in opposite directions.
- alexhutcheson 7y agoTrue - it's confusing from there as well!
- mruts 7y agoI’ve seen foreign tourists get off at Newark instead of New York multiple times. I alwaya hoped they figured it out before it’s too late...
- cameldrv 7y agoIt makes more sense if you know that there used to be multiple competing private passenger railroads. Penn Station was the station for the Pennsylvania Railroad. The Pennsylvania Railroad had stops in Newark and in New York. Other railroads had their own stations. Some railroads had shared stations, hence Grand Central, and all of the stations called Union Station. Of course the PRR hasn't existed in 50 years so maybe it's time to change the name...
- butisaidsudo 7y agoThere's also three Strawberry, Californias! Found that out the hard way when I went to meet a fried at the general store in Strawberry, and wound up a few hours away from him.
- lstamour 7y agoAt least once a year, something I buy from a US retailer for shipping to Ontario, Canada ends up in Ontario, CA if it transits from a Pacific time zone. It’s rather frustrating to have that extra delay, and I’m sure the shipping depots that service Ontario, CA or these other confusingly named areas don’t appreciate the extra workload...
- Dylan16807 7y agoIn a world with easy to disambiguate postal codes, that's kind of sad.
- vxNsr 7y agoRight, isn’t that the purpose of zip codes?
- briffle 7y agoThe thing that blows my east coast friends' minds, is that is a 6-hour drive to Portland if traffic is nice. All Interstate freeway, but never leaving Oregon, and the biggest town along the way is 20k people.
- arcticfox 7y agoLately the most standard response when people hear I'm from Oregon: "Oh, Portland! Cool." It takes a minute to explain that Portland is to remote parts of Oregon like...New York City is to Morgantown, West Virginia in both distance and everything else.
- shartshooter 7y agoDouble fun fact, they’re technically on mountain time and not pacific because of their proximity to Boise[1] 1) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Oregon https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Oregon
- davidw 7y agoAnd the southern bit of the same county is back in Pacific time because it's nearer to Nevada. It's one of the few counties in the US with multiple time zones. If you drive from Bend to, say, Winnemucca, you go from Pacific to Mountain and back to Pacific.
- ww520 7y agoFun fact: another Ontario, https://www.ontarioca.gov/ https://www.ontarioca.gov/