The municipal street gazetteer was a tool capable of symbolising the dawn of a new era for the city. Use of Spanish and the imposition of references alien to the memory of most local residents under Francoism gave way to the use of Catalan and recovery of the popular names of streets and squares, which translated into successive changes in the gazetteer.

These changes were not decided in City Hall. They came from the neighbourhoods: the District Municipal Council proposed the changes and the executive approved them.

The importance of the street gazetteer was such that the first thing the District VII Municipal Council did after it had been constituted was to change the name of several streets. For example, Calle Zumalacárregui, named after a nineteenth-century Carlist leader, became Carrer de Riego, after the progressive general that the republican anthem would be named after – very apt for the new democratic times – while Calle Unidad was changed to Carrer de l’Autonomia.