A WOMAN who had problems directing an ambulance to an Oxford road with no name has welcomed a decision to formally identify the street.

Liz Mitchell was walking along the then nameless cul-de-sac in Blackbird Leys in November last year when her 81-year-old mother Sylvia Dodgson tripped on the pavement and fell.

Mrs Mitchell called an ambulance but was forced to direct the ambulance to nearby Rest Harrow, and then guide the crew to the un-named cul-de-sac, off Field Avenue, once they were in the area.

Mrs Mitchell, of John Snow Place, Headington, said she felt the street, which does not have any houses in it but leads to Starwort Path and a two-storey block of maisonettes, needed a name to avoid any problems in the future.

She said the confusion delayed the paramedics’ arrival by about five minutes, which she said could affect someone’s chances of survival in serious incidents.

Mrs Mitchell, 42, said: “It was a Saturday evening and I had taken my mum to the theatre. We were on our way back and she fell in that area. She stepped off the kerb to walk diagonally across the square and she fell off it.

“It was freezing cold and it was dark and the ambulance were asking me for an address.

“She lives in a street nearby. She’s in Rest Harrow so we had to direct the ambulance there and then direct them all the way back round to where we were.”

“It was quite a stressful situation not to be able to give an address or road name.

“It seemed crazy and I thought it needs a name.”

Mrs Mitchell contacted Oxford City Council, which consulted the estate’s councillors for their views and suggested Burdock Court as the new name, in keeping with the theme of plant and herb names for nearby streets, a proposal which has been endorsed.

Council officers will now order a sign for the street and notify the emergency services of the decision.

Mrs Mitchell, who works in IT at Oxford University, said: “I think it’s a great name. It fits in with the area and it carries on with the theme.”

South Central Ambulance Service spokesman James Keating-Wilkes said the service welcomed the idea of naming the access road if it helped crews to find their way there more quickly.

Last month, residents complained that visitors to the area found it difficult to find their homes, because they were not easily identifiable.