AM I IN SOHO
OR NOHO?

Methodology

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a person on Earth must be either south of Houston Street or north of it.

Houston Street separates SoHo from the neighborhoods north of it in Lower Manhattan. Unfortunately, Houston Street ends at the rivers, while the rest of Earth continues.

So we extended it.

Within Manhattan, this website approximates the actual path of Houston Street using a series of geographic coordinates. At your east–west position, we interpolate between the nearest points to estimate where Houston Street passes.

Outside Manhattan, the two ends of Houston Street must continue around the globe. There are two defensible ways to extend a street across an entire planet. We could not choose, so you may:

The Great Circle Method

Houston Street points in a direction, and we keep walking in exactly that direction without ever turning. On a sphere, walking straight ahead traces a great circle—the path an airplane flies, the truest possible meaning of "extending" a street. Because Houston Street tilts slightly south of due east, its extensions leave Manhattan, sweep down across the Pacific and the Southern Hemisphere, dip as far as 40.7° South, and return. The boundary is a tilted ring around the planet. A consequence of taking geometry seriously: San Francisco is in NoHo.

The measured boundary within Manhattan. Dots mark the measured coordinates. Beyond the rivers, the dashed ends continue straight, in the direction the street points.

The Latitude Method

The western end of Houston Street continues due west along its exact latitude, 40.72915° North. The eastern end continues due east along its own, 40.71965° North. A latitude line is not actually straight—following one requires turning constantly, which is a strange thing for a street to do—but it preserves the intuition that SoHo is simply everything sufficiently far south. Under this method the entire Southern Hemisphere, most of Asia, all of Africa, and San Francisco are in SoHo. NoHo gets Canada and most of Europe.

The same measured boundary. Beyond the rivers, the dashed ends run exactly horizontal, each along its own endpoint's latitude.

Under either method, the two ends of Houston Street produce slightly different worldwide boundaries, so they must hand off somewhere. We switch between them on the meridian opposite Manhattan, approximately 180 degrees away from New York—drawn dashed on the globe below. A person standing on that meridian could change neighborhoods by taking a single step. We consider this acceptable.

Every point on Earth, correctly assigned under your chosen method. The dashed line in the Pacific is the antipodal meridian where the two Houston extensions meet. It is not a bug; it is a convention.

The final rule is simple:

This methodology is geographically consistent, mathematically deterministic, and recognized by no municipal authority whatsoever.

About the Author

Máximo Jalife studied applied mathematics as an undergraduate at Columbia University. He has worked as a trader and as a quantitative strategist, and is currently part of the founding team of a Series A tech startup.

This website is a personal project and is not affiliated with any of those institutions.

You can reach him on LinkedIn.