Bye bye apostrophe

Photo by James Cridland

I am dismayed by the news that Birmingham City Council has decided to ban apostrophes on street signs (read story here).

I suppose there are far more important things to worry about: the breakdown of society, rising knife crime, the credit crunch. But I love moaning, and I think this is actually quite important.

From now on, no sign produced by the council will contain an apostrophe, so for example, Queen’s Square will now be Queens Square. The ‘brains’ behind this decision claim that it will cut costs and avoid confusion. In my opinion, it’s just sloppiness and ‘dumbing down’.

By the way, I was not surprised to hear that it was Birmingham City Council who introduced this policy. Only a few months ago, they printed a leaflet promoting Birmingham’s recycling achievements, beautifully illustrated with an image of the city skyline. It was only after they had sent 720,000 leaflets to residents that they discovered the picture was of Birmingham, Alabama, not Birmingham UK. At first, they claimed it was not an error, just a ‘generic skyline’. Need I say more?

What do you think? Am I overreacting? Or do you agree? Let me know by adding your comments below.