4.1 Memorizing Addresses, Cross Streets, Building Layouts & Pursuit Paths
Key Takeaways
On DCAS Exam No. 7307, Memorization is officially defined as remembering words, numbers, pictures, and procedures either by themselves or with other pieces of information, such as recalling the location of a robbery.
Because calculators, smartwatches, cell phones, and unapproved reference notes are strictly banned at DCAS testing centers, candidates must encode street numbers, Queens hyphenated addresses, and apartment designators using structured mental chunking.
Preserve hyphenated address prefix and suffix exactly and compare changed digits; do not infer a nearest cross street from a prefix.
Retain vertical and interior building layouts using the Outside-to-Inside Spatial Chain: Entry Point -> Courtyard or Wing -> Stairwell or Elevator -> Floor Level -> Apartment Designator -> Gate Keypad Code.
Track multi-turn foot or vehicle pursuit paths with the Origin–Turn–Turn–Terminus (O-T-T-T) chain, binding each cardinal direction (North, South, East, West) to its specific street name and terminal landmark.
Note
Original OpenExamPrep practice: the directives, codes, priorities, addresses, maps, and console workflows below are fictional exercise inputs. They do not establish NYPD policy or disclose secure DCAS formats. Use each supplied rule.
Memorizing Addresses, Cross Streets, Building Layouts & Pursuit Paths
On the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS) Notice of Examination for Exam No. 7307 (Police Communications Technician, Title Code No. 71012), Memorization is one of the seven core tested abilities. DCAS officially defines Memorization as:
"Remembering information, such as words, numbers, pictures and procedures. Pieces of information can be remembered by themselves or with other pieces of information. Example: A Police Communications Technician might use this ability when recalling the location of a robbery."
Inside the NYPD Communications Section at Public Safety Answering Center I (PSAC I) in Brooklyn and PSAC II in the Bronx, location memory is a critical life-safety skill. During an emergency 911 intake call, a frantic caller may blurt out an address, apartment number, and fleeing direction in a two-second burst before hanging up or losing cell reception. Likewise, at a radio dispatch console, a field unit in a fast foot or vehicle pursuit transmits rapid street-by-street updates while the Police Communications Technician (PCT) is switching Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) screens. Transposing two digits in a house number or flipping a directional prefix can send responding patrol units to the wrong block.
1. NYC Street Addresses & Digit-Transposition Defense
In these memory drills, practice whether you can encode dense location strings and reject distractors with subtle numeric or street-type alterations. Because calculators, smartwatches, cell phones, and unapproved notes are prohibited at DCAS testing centers, use mental chunking to lock down four elements of every New York City address:
House Number Chunking
Compare single-digit rehearsal with chunking and use the approach that improves your own exact recall. Reading 1408 as "one-four-zero-eight" stores four separate digits that easily scramble into 1804 or 1048. Instead, try grouping four-digit house numbers into two-digit spoken pairs ("fourteen oh-eight") and three-digit numbers into a hundred-anchor plus two-digit pair (241 = "two-hundred forty-one," distinct from 214 = "two-hundred fourteen"). Guard the middle two digits of four-digit numbers and the final two digits of three-digit numbers against transposition.
Queens Hyphenated Address Encoding
Queens uses a hyphenated grid system, such as 118-35 Queens Boulevard. For this drill, retain 118 and 35 as separate address chunks. Do not infer a nearest cross street from the prefix; use the full supplied address and map information. Exam distractors routinely invert post-hyphen digits (118-35 vs. 118-53) or swap numbers across the hyphen (118-35 vs. 135-18). Encode every Queens address as [Prefix] – [Suffix] ("118th block, building 35").
Directional Prefixes & Street Suffixes
Across the five boroughs, identical street numbers recur with different directional prefixes (East 161st Street vs. West 161st Street; North Conduit Avenue vs. South Conduit Avenue) and different suffixes (Avenue, Street, Boulevard, Road, Place, Concourse, Parkway). In Queens neighborhoods like Maspeth and Fresh Meadows, 69th Avenue, 69th Road, 69th Drive, 69th Place, and 69th Street lie within blocks of one another.
Warning
The Suffix & Borough Substitution Trap: Practice distractors often preserve the exact house number and street number while changing only the suffix (241 East 86th Avenue instead of 241 East 86th Street) or flipping the directional prefix (241 West 86th Street). Create a three-word verbal tag connecting Prefix + Number + Suffix (such as "East-86-Street").
2. Vertical & Interior Building Layout Notes
In New York City's high-rise apartments, NYCHA developments, commercial towers, and walk-up tenements, responding patrol and Emergency Service Unit (ESU) officers need exact three-dimensional interior routing. Retain interior building notes using the Outside-to-Inside Spatial Chain:
- Perimeter Entry Point: Distinguish between the main front lobby, rear alley entrance, courtyard gate, basement/cellar hatch, or roof access door (
rear courtyard entrance off Decatur Avenue). - Wing & Stairwell Letter: Lock in the wing and stairwell or elevator bank (
North Wing, Stairwell B). To avoid confusing acoustic look-alike letters (B,C,D,E,P,T,V), convert the letter into a phonetic word (Stairwell B= Bravo Stairwell;Stairwell D= Delta Stairwell). - Floor Level & Apartment Designator: Pair the floor level with the apartment designator (
4th Floor, Apt 4Bvs.Apt 4D, orBasement Apt B2). - Security-Gate Keypad Code: For a gate or vestibule code (such as
#4820*or*1945#), lock the leading/trailing symbol (#Pound vs.*Star) around the two-digit pair (48-20) so distractors cannot flip#4820*to*4820#.
3. Cross Streets & Landmark Anchoring
Callers reporting outdoor robberies or collisions often give bounding intersections and commercial landmarks instead of a house number—for example: "northeast corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street, beside the check-cashing store." Build a Corner–Cross–Landmark Triad:
- Compass Quadrant: Picture a four-quadrant intersection cross (
+) and mark top-right for Northeast (NE), top-left for Northwest (NW), bottom-right for Southeast (SE), or bottom-left for Southwest (SW). - Primary Artery + Cross Street: Set the north-south avenue (
Nostrand Avenue) as the vertical axis and the east-west street (Fulton Street) as the horizontal axis. - Physical Landmark Stamp: Place a vivid image of the landmark (
check-cashing store,green-awning bodega,uptown subway entrance) directly inside that marked corner quadrant.
4. Multi-Turn Pursuit Paths (O-T-T-T Mental Chaining)
When a suspect flees on foot or by vehicle, encode the sequential movement string—such as "started at 125th Street and Lenox Avenue, ran north on Lenox Avenue, turned east onto 127th Street, and then turned south into the alley behind the pharmacy at 142 West 127th Street"—using Origin–Turn–Turn–Terminus (O-T-T-T) Mental Chaining:
- Origin (
O): Starting intersection (125th Street & Lenox Avenue). - Turn 1 (
T1): First vector = North onLenox Avenue. - Turn 2 (
T2): Second vector = East on127th Street. - Terminus (
T): Final concealment point = into thealley behind the pharmacy at 142 West 127th Street.
Trace the geometric path on your desk edge with your index finger (Up -> Right -> Down) as you read. Mental tracing can help expose any distractor that reverses a turn (such as "turned west onto 127th Street").
| Location Memory Target | Raw Intake Example | Common Practice Distractor | Active Encoding Defense |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard NYC House Address | 1408 Amsterdam Avenue | Middle-digit flip (1804 or 1048) or suffix swap (Amsterdam Street) | Group into 2-digit spoken pairs ("fourteen oh-eight") + tag suffix type |
| Queens Hyphenated Address | 118-35 Queens Boulevard | Post-hyphen digit swap (118-53) or cross-hyphen swap (135-18) | Preserve the exact prefix ("118th block, building 35") |
| Interior Building Routing | Rear courtyard, Stairwell B, 4th Fl, Apt 4D, Code #4820* | Phonetic letter swap (Stairwell D, Apt 4B) or symbol flip (*4820#) | Use Outside-to-Inside chain + phonetic alphabet ("Bravo Stair, Delta Apt") |
| Intersection & Landmark | NE corner of Nostrand Ave & Fulton St by check-cashing store | Compass quadrant flip (NW or SE corner) | Stamp landmark image into top-right (NE) quadrant of mental + map |
| Multi-Turn Pursuit Path | 125th & Lenox -> N on Lenox -> E on 127th -> S into pharmacy alley | Reversing one turn (W on 127th) or swapping Turn 1 and Turn 2 streets | Trace O-T-T-T trajectory (Up -> Right -> Down) with finger on desk |
Picture Recall: A Supplied Scene
Study this schematic, then look away and recall object + position + relation. The diagram is an original memory image, not a map of a real address. Use the compass words in the labels; the schematic is not a scale map.
Ask yourself which entrance is east, where the bicycle stands, and which letter belongs to the south gate. The answers are Stairwell D/blue door, center courtyard/red bicycle, and Gate B. Reopen the image to check each relation. Merely remembering that both B and D appeared is insufficient: swapping gate B with stairwell D loses their associations. Next, redraw the layout mentally with one label hidden and retrieve that missing label before checking it. This trains picture recall separately from reading a prose address.
Official ability definition source: DCAS 7307 Notice of Examination, checked October 13, 2026. Practice classifications and methods above are independently authored.
Independent practice. During a 911 intake call, a witness reports an armed burglary in progress at 118-35 Queens Boulevard, Rear Courtyard Entrance, Stairwell B, 4th Floor, Apartment 4D, with courtyard keypad code #7390*. Which encoding strategy best prevents the most common memory-practice distractor traps for this location?
Anchor 118 as the exact prefix and 35 as the exact suffix, trace an Outside-to-Inside chain using phonetic labels (Bravo Stairwell to 4th Floor Delta Apartment), and lock the pound-to-star symbol wrapper around seventy-three ninety.
Repeat the single digits 1-1-8-3-5-4-7-3-9-0 in a continuous numerical loop while focusing primarily on the borough name and street suffix so that interior apartment letters can be reconstructed later from memory.
Group the apartment letter and stairwell letter together as an alphabetical pair (B-D) first, convert the Queens address into a non-hyphenated five-digit number (11,835), and memorize the four keypad digits without symbols.
Visualize the 4th-floor apartment interior first, work backward toward the street number 118-53, and group the keypad code with the house suffix so all numbers are stored in a single combined mental list.
Independent practice. A patrol unit transmits the following foot pursuit update over the radio: "Suspect fled from the southwest corner of Grand Concourse and East 161st Street, ran south on Grand Concourse, turned east onto East 158th Street, and entered the basement laundry door of 241 East 158th Street." Using the Origin–Turn–Turn–Terminus (O-T-T-T) method, which sequence accurately captures the pursuit trajectory?
Origin: SE corner of Grand Concourse & East 161st St -> Turn 1: South on Grand Concourse -> Turn 2: West on East 158th St -> Terminus: Basement door at 241 East 158th St
Origin: SW corner of Grand Concourse & East 161st St -> Turn 1: East on East 161st St -> Turn 2: South on Grand Concourse -> Terminus: Basement door at 214 East 158th St
Origin: SW corner of Grand Concourse & East 161st St -> Turn 1: South on Grand Concourse -> Turn 2: East on East 158th St -> Terminus: Basement door at 241 East 158th St
Origin: SW corner of Grand Concourse & West 161st St -> Turn 1: North on Grand Concourse -> Turn 2: East on East 158th St -> Terminus: Main lobby at 241 East 158th St
Independent practice. How does the official DCAS Notice of Examination for Exam No. 7307 define the ability of Memorization, and what operational task does it cite as its benchmark example?
Applying general NYPD rules to specific dispatch problems to reach a logical staffing conclusion, illustrated by assigning a patrol sector to a high-priority burglary.
Combining separate pieces of caller information to form a general conclusion about crime patterns, illustrated by linking two separate 911 calls to the same vehicle.
Following a given rule or set of rules to arrange sentences, numbers, or dispatch tasks in a certain sequence, illustrated by sorting pending jobs by priority level.
Remembering information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures by themselves or with other information, illustrated by recalling the location of a robbery.
Independent practice. A caller reports a street assault at the northwest corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street beside a pharmacy, and states that the suspect ran to 1408 Fulton Street, Apartment 3C. Which distractor below represents a pure internal digit-transposition trap rather than a directional or landmark trap?
Northeast corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street beside a pharmacy, with the suspect fleeing to 1408 Fulton Street, Apartment 3C.
Northwest corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street beside a pharmacy, with the suspect fleeing to 1804 Fulton Street, Apartment 3C.
Northwest corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Avenue beside a bakery, with the suspect fleeing to 1408 Fulton Avenue, Apartment 3C.
Northwest corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street beside a pharmacy, with the suspect fleeing to 1408 Fulton Street, Apartment 3B.
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.