On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:

the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?
--
Thoss

"thoss" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:
the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

I can't think of any roads near me with missing apostrophes, but there's a
Mañana Road near me, and the city and post office both write it as "Manana
Rd" to keep things simple (though it's "Mañana Rd" on highway signs).

S

--
Stephen Sprunk "Stupid people surround themselves with smart
CCIE #3723 people. Smart people surround themselves with
K5SSS smart people who disagree with them." --Aaron Sorkin


--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Stephen Sprunk wrote:
"thoss" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:
the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

I can't think of any roads near me with missing apostrophes, but there's a
Mañana Road near me, and the city and post office both write it as "Manana
Rd" to keep things simple (though it's "Mañana Rd" on highway signs).

S

--
Stephen Sprunk "Stupid people surround themselves with smart
CCIE #3723 people. Smart people surround themselves with
K5SSS smart people who disagree with them." --Aaron Sorkin


--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

There is a road through Beverly Hills, its name is spelt variously
"Cañon Drive" and "Canon Drive".

Adrian.

On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 Stephen Sprunk wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make
signs and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St.
John's" becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

Well, the first change is welcome because your original is wrong IMHO.
To quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary "Abbreviations are made chiefly
in two ways....(2)Some portion of the middle of the word is dropped out,
the first and last letter being retained...the writing of a full stop at
the end of these, though now usual, is to be deprecated....The method
adopted in the following list is to omit the otiose full stop".
--
Thoss

thoss wrote:
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 Stephen Sprunk wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make
signs and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St.
John's" becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

Well, the first change is welcome because your original is wrong IMHO.
To quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary "Abbreviations are made chiefly
in two ways....(2)Some portion of the middle of the word is dropped out,
the first and last letter being retained...the writing of a full stop at
the end of these, though now usual, is to be deprecated....The method
adopted in the following list is to omit the otiose full stop".
--
Thoss

Anyone who abbreviates Cheshunt should do so cautiously....

On Thu, 29 Jun 2006 Marksman wrote:


thoss wrote:
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 Stephen Sprunk wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make
signs and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St.
John's" becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

Well, the first change is welcome because your original is wrong IMHO.
To quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary "Abbreviations are made chiefly
in two ways....(2)Some portion of the middle of the word is dropped out,
the first and last letter being retained...the writing of a full stop at
the end of these, though now usual, is to be deprecated....The method
adopted in the following list is to omit the otiose full stop".
--
Thoss

Anyone who abbreviates Cheshunt should do so cautiously....

Eh? I've never knowingly written the name of that town, in full or
abbreviated.
--
Thoss

"thoss" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 Stephen Sprunk wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make
signs and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St.
John's" becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

Well, the first change is welcome because your original is wrong IMHO.
To quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary "Abbreviations are made chiefly
in two ways....(2)Some portion of the middle of the word is dropped out,
the first and last letter being retained...the writing of a full stop at
the end of these, though now usual, is to be deprecated....The method
adopted in the following list is to omit the otiose full stop".
--
Thoss

as in St John St. EC1

D A Stocks



Inviato da X-Privat.Org - Registrazione gratuita http://www.x-privat.org/join.php

In article "Stephen Sprunk" writes:
....
In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

As far as I know in British English there is no full stop following an
abbreviation if the last letter of the abbreviation is also the last
letter of the complete word. (This is different in US English.)
--
dik t. winter, cwi, kruislaan 413, 1098 sj amsterdam, nederland, +31205924131
home: bovenover 215, 1025 jn amsterdam, nederland; http://www.cwi.nl/~dik/

On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 14:27:40 -0500, "Stephen Sprunk"
wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

Sorry - I've had technical problems, so am following this up very
late, but have also observed a lot of punctuation on signs.

Removing punctuation certainly isn't the policy on London Underground
signage. In the new Western ticket hall at King's Cross the signs
refer consistently to 'King's Cross' and 'St. Pancras' even though, as
discussed elsewhere in the thread, it would be more usual to write 'St
Pancras' without a full-stop in British English at least.
Incidentally 'St Pancras' is both the form used on most of the main
line station signage and the form that I would normally use in
writing.

As it happens, since this thread started, I drove past a well-known
posh restaurant just outside Oxford, and noted signs to it as 'Le
Manoir au Quat' saisons' *with* the apostrophe on after 'quat'. These
were standard British road signs with the brown background used for
tourist attractions and the like, and again the convention appears to
be to include punctuation on these signs

Martin

Stephen Sprunk wrote:
In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

Melbourne has a laneway named after Australian rock band AC/DC (where
the slash is generally written as a lightning bolt). But slashes -- let
alone lightning bolts -- aren't permitted in Melbourne City Council
street names, so it's "ACDC Lane".

Pic of the sign he
http://www.danielbowen.com/2004/10/22/ac-dc/

Regards,

Daniel