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Slag Street resident of 50 years, Sid Siddall, has had enough of his street sign going missing. Like most of the streets in Broken Hill, his street is a nod to the city's mining heritage, with "slag" the name for the city's slag heap — the waste from melting iron ore. Many streets in the far west NSW city are named after minerals or other mining terms. But only Slag Street keeps having its sign stolen. "Just leave the sign alone, it was a good sign," Mr Siddall said. While neither Mr Siddall nor Broken Hill City Council knew exactly number how many times the sign had been stolen, the council said replacement signs lasted about a month before going missing again. Mr Siddall, who lives with Parkinson's disease and drop foot, was worried emergency services would get lost or delayed the next time he called. Proud of 'unique' street name Located on the edge of town, Mr Siddall and his wife, Janet, moved into their Slag Street home in the 1970s. The quiet suburban street was the perfect place to raise their children. The Slag Street community was close-knit, consisting of just three houses. In addition to his family's 50-year connection to the street, Mr Siddall was also proud to live on a street named after the slag heap monument in Broken Hill's centre. In 2013, when the NSW Geographical Names Board was looking into the names of streets with offensive, racist, derogatory or demeaning names around the state, there were rumblings that Slag Street could be on the chopping block. At the time, a resident admitted giving out their address was sometimes met with misunderstanding, with them having to explain "slag" was a mining by-product. Slag Street residents, including Mr Siddall, were opposed to a change and were happy when the name stayed. "I thought it was a good name, because all the streets in Broken Hill are named after minerals and I think it's unique," he said. "We're quite proud of it." Theft raises health fears Mr Siddall said he had become more prone to falls due to his drop foot condition, which made him unable to lift the front part of his foot, causing it to drag when he walked. He said he had seen audacious thieves take the sign while he watched them from his front porch. "They came up to the signpost in a four-wheel drive and stood on the roo bar at the front and undid the nuts and took the sign," he said. With his health increasingly requiring urgent help, Mr Siddall worried what the life-threatening repercussions could be if ambulance services could not find his street due to the missing sign. He said that was the case three years ago when he suffered a bad fall in his front garden and broke his arm. His wife had called triple-0 but believed the ambulance got lost, although he could not recall if the sign was missing at the time. He said the ambulance had driven past on other occasions he had called for help. A NSW Ambulance spokesperson said the lack of street sign had little to no impact on travel time, and Slag Street did appear on the service's GPS. Slag Street merchandise? Replacement of the sign has been costly and relentless for Broken Hill City Council. Mayor Tom Kennedy said he was interested in looking at other ways to ensure the sign stayed put. "There needs to be a way to secure the signs, so they don't get taken every couple of months," he said. He also floated an idea which the visitor information centre could get in on. "The council actually has those signs, so perhaps instead of stealing them you could go in [and buy them]," he said. "We should get replicas made; there needs to be something done, but I suppose part of the fun is taking the sign itself."
