Unlike that of North Yorkshire’s street signs, punctuation isn’t set in stone

The news of North Yorkshire Council's decision to omit apostrophes from street signs caused a public uproar – a fact that soon became a news story in its own right. 

In May, presenters of BBC Breakfast said the programme received "hundreds and hundreds" of emails from disgruntled viewers after a segment aired in which Sally Nugent explained how the council had "done away with [apostrophes] altogether” because the punctuation confused computer systems.  

The backlash was swift and brutal, with one resident taking a marker pen to correct a street sign, and many turning to social media to voice their outrage… 

“Not sure why we’re all worried about AI taking over, when according to @NorthYorkshireCountyCouncil computers can’t even cope with apostrophes!” 

 “Why oh why is putting an apostrophe in its correct place to indicate possession or plural so difficult? Don't dumb down grammar!!” 

“This is shocking! Language is important, and I worry that this may be the thin end of the wedge!”

Happily, the council soon reversed its decision, with Keane Duncan, the council’s executive member for highways, assuring that "the apostrophe will live on in North Yorkshire". He declared that the area would remain a "haven of proper punctuation, on street signs at least", promising that all new signs would be punctuated correctly. 

Hooray. A happy ending. 

For me, this story is as intriguing as it is hilarious. Why would the public have such a strong reaction to a story about punctuation, when grammar, language and punction is changing all the time? Perhaps it’s to do with the format - the street sign - which seems like a faintly ridiculous permanent marker, reflecting our society in some unchanging way.  

In a society characterised by smart screens and digital communication, perhaps the street sign is punctuation’s last refuge. These days, we tend towards a lighter markup of written text: most of us consume content via a screen, so writing needs to be less cluttered, so as not to be off-putting. 

Consider the traditional practice of using two spaces after a full stop. This was necessary because typewriters originally had monospaced fonts (that is, thin and wide letters took up the same amount of space), so two spaces after ending punctuation marks such as full stops were used to make the text more legible. However, with modern proportional fonts, this practice has fallen out of favour - we use a single space after full stops, colons, question marks, and exclamation points, rather than two.  

Hyphenation rules have also relaxed: we tend to decide how and when to use them on a case-by-case basis, removing the hyphen if it adds clutter and keeping it in if it adds clarity. So, instead of "first-quarter", we use "first quarter” and hyphens are often omitted in double-E combination words, like "preeminent" and "preeclampsia". Likewise, we use far fewer commas these days, removing them to give a cleaner look to copy. When it comes to punctuation, less, it would seem, is best. 

The use of quotation marks has also changed (much to my disapproval) and we often see single and double quotation marks used interchangeably. I must admit, this one does really annoy me, and I will continue to reserve single quotation marks for quotes within quotes or for titles, come what may. 

Other rules that we regularly see broken, though not specific to punctuation, include starting sentences with coordinating conjunctions like "and" or "but” and ending sentences with prepositions – a tool we all use to avoid awkward phrasing. My point: the aim of grammar and punctuation is to help us communicate clearly and effectively, not to hold us back from adapting to new styles of writing. 

Still, the skirmish over street signs in North Yorkshire highlights how deeply punctuation practices have become entrenched, and how important these rules are to many of us. As we navigate an increasingly digital world, language will of course evolve, and we will have to learn to balance tradition and modernity in punctation and grammar. Although, obviously street signs should have apostrophes.