In Joncels, a small Hérault village of 266 inhabitants, even the wind turbines now have an address

Le maire, entouré des deux postières qui l'ont aidé à réaliser l'adressage de toutes les voies de sa commune. L.T.

The 3DS law is not unanimous, particularly in hamlets where there is fear of a loss of identity. By June 1 at the latest, all of the approximately 35,000 municipalities in France must have completed their addressing, that is, give a name to all the roads and number each home. A toponymic revolution that is not always simple. The small town of 266 inhabitants, located near Lodève, had 97% of the numbering of its homes to review. The mayor preferred to use the services of La Poste. Narrative.

Accessing Beros Haut, in Joncels, will no longer be a treasure hunt. "It’s a good thing, concedes Mayor Rémy Pailhes. I had to call emergency services recently and to guide them, I tried to show them the way from the main road, but the operator couldn't find it. Fortunately, it was not a life-threatening emergency…"

Just the name of the recipient and the village…

In this small Hérault village of 266 souls located on the Cabalas plateau near Lodève, as in many rural communities, there were until then few precise addresses. Streets without numbers, hamlets or localities..."Sometimes even, on certain letters, there was just the name of the recipient and that of the village. It must be said that the postman knew everyone", continues the councilor, elected here since 1978. Joëlle Pelletier confirms. For six years, she was Joncels' postwoman. "I had to get to know each house, each inhabitant", she remembers.

That's it. A few years later, the postmistress walked the streets, paths and hamlets of Joncy again, but in new roles, with a plan in her hands to complete the addressing of the village. In other words: naming and numbering each lane, an obligation since the vote by Parliament, on February 8, 2021, of the 3DS law. Cities with more than 2,000 inhabitants had to have carried out this work before January 1, 2024, the others have a deadline of six months, until June 1. Fortunately, there are currently no sanctions for the offenders. "In the department of Hérault, 160 municipalities (out of 342, Editor's note) have a quality of ;addressing considered average", reveals Joëlle Pelletier.

The figure: 8.4%

This is, according to the Post Office, the percentage of tracks in France (i.e. 202,951 tracks) which remained unnumbered until now. the end of the year 2023. A rate clearly increasing (19% at the end of 2019, 15% at the end of 2021), but there is still work. Only 43.8% of municipalities with less than 2,000 inhabitants and 57.8% with more than 2,000 inhabitants have achieved this. a first update provision of their “Local address base”, as required by the 3DS law.

Rescue and optical fiber

The former postwoman is now "address referent" of La Poste for the West Hérault sector. It is to her that many mayors appeal, as did the mayor of Joncels in order to comply with the law. "We could have done so. do it ourselves since it is the municipalities which have the competence, but it is a complex job. We therefore turned to the experts, slips Rémy Pailhes.

The postal service has a cost, more or less expensive depending on the size of the city or village, depending on the options – the service goes as far as the supply of signs -, but this allows municipal councils to then deliberate in complete serenity on this toponymic revolution, which has become more than necessary for the inhabitants. "This facilitates and accelerates the arrival of emergency services, it’s essential to allow connection to a high-speed internet connection and it avoids having to have trucks delivery which goes in all directions in the village", lists the mayor. In fact, in recent years, online sales have continued to increase, in Joncels as everywhere in France, and it is not always the local postman who delivers these packages.< /p>

Diagnosis, deliberations, metric system…

Last spring, using the cadastral map and digital geolocation tools, Joëlle Pelletier first carried out a diagnosis. &quot ;This made it possible to determine that around twenty roads out of 60 did not have names, that most of the others had numbering defects and above all that 97% of address points were unnumbered", she remembers.

The work began with a diagnosis of the village's addressing before carrying out the operations. It took three months. L.T.

The municipal council then had to baptize, by deliberation, the previously anonymous roads. "La Poste had the possibility of offering us a catalog of names, but we preferred references to the history of the village, or even specific to each route"< /em>, says the mayor. The roads or paths which lead to the different hamlets took their names, for example, which made it possible to maintain the identity of the places and avoid disputes as in other villages.