URL page names moving from test to production?

I have an existing online store that I am converting to ZC. When I "flip the switch", I'll load an .htaccess file that maps each of the old url's to the new. (What a pain! But worthwhile)

I'm building ZC on the server in a test environment. When I'm done, I'll create a new database for production, copy the test system to production, test that out, then upload the .htaccess file to my old store's directory. And voila, I'm up and running on the new store. (Oh so easy, right??? :)

When I do this copy, will all the url page names remain the same, so that the .htacess file I'm building is accurate? I would be terribly unhappy if I found out my mapping was no longer accurate because the page names changed in production! (I do realize that I will have to change the "test" part of the name to the permanent part of the name.)

I'm wondering if it would be safer to build my new ZC on the production database, and then copy it to test for going forward development and changes. Sounds backwards, but since it's separate from my current production store, it wouldn't be a problem.

The only possible problem would be that you would have to clean up leftover categories, products, accounts, etc from the building/testing phase, and product, order, customer etc. ids would not start from 0. This only matters if you are fanatical about that orderliness.