| York St John University | University in the Heart of York | Search | Site Map |

We use cookies on our website to provide you with the best possible user experience. Disabling these cookies may prevent our site from working efficiently. To find out more about our cookies read our privacy policy.

Finding Your Way Around

York is not the world's biggest city, in fact it is quite small (most places within the city are within walking distance) but because of its historical origins the inner city streets can be a bit of a maze so it can be easy to lose track of where you are. 

In the city centre the street names can also be confusing as they are not actually called streets, they are actually called gates (Whip Ma Whop Ma Gate being a particularly fine example of this). 

There are also the remains of the walls of the city and the old gatehouses but just to be even more confusing these gates are called bars.  If all this is not making any sense then try and remember this little ditty:

York, where the streets are gates, the gates are bars and the bars are pubs.

York is a great place to go exploring and down some of the older streets you will find a range of interesting shops and pubs while the newer streets have all your high street stores.

To help you go exploring use the maps below, we have also included a map which shows cycle routes as York is a big cycling city and it is a great way of exploring a little bit further afield.