Sydney - Eden route

Thanks for clearing that up. I will go via Cooma. Haven't been down Brown Mountain since I was a kid. Should be good.

Thanks for that. I think I will go via Cooma. Appreciate your input.

"It was probably named after a Prince, therefore Princes Highway"
Then it would be Prince's

It will be Princess’ before much longer, everything else is being emasculated.
I live near a major provincial city on the Prince’s Highway & it really irks me that it is so often referred to as the Princess Highway, even in local business’ advertising.

I know the pain. My street, Nicoll Ave gets Nickel, Nicole or Nickle all the time. The postie is used it though.

It's been pronounced Princess since I can remember. They even say that on the traffic reports on Sydney radio. Go figure. :-)

I suppose the lack of an apostrophe confuses people, including me. Unless the naming party deliberately intended the plural form then it should be just Prince Hwy or Prince's Hwy if named after the Prince and even Princes' if named after more than one.

I think it may have been named to honour Prince Albert.

Hi everyone,

It's been a while, but if you check back in history, I think you'll find it was originally Prince's Highway - the same name applied to the coastal (or almost coastal ??) section here in SA.

However, when computers came into use in government departments and the Geographical Names Act came into effect, oh, probably 30-odd years ago, all place and road/street names in this state and, I understand, the whole country, which had previously contained an apostrophe, had those apostrophes unceremoniously removed. Hence, Sellick's Hill became Sellicks Hill, Prince's Highway became Princes Highway and so on.

As for pronouncing Princes as Princess, who knows? Laziness, lack of understanding, or even carelessness perhaps originally, which may have become entrenched through word of mouth, just like the game of Chinese whispers.

If I'm mistaken, please correct me, because my older brain might be starting to fade, but I'm pretty certain that this is the explanation.

Yes, Charlie, I think you may be right.

I remember reading a column by Gareth Powell, the then Fairfax computer columnist and, I think, travel writer to a lesser degree.

He was bemoaning the loss of apostrophes when the powers-that-be reviewed some of the signage on the Hume Hwy, in particular Run o' Waters creek which the shiney bums changed to Run Of Waters - a little less poetic in his view.

I'm not sure, but I think he and maybe some locals won the day re the "f" in "of", but they never got the apostrophe back, just a couple of added hyphens, IIRC. Pretty sure it's Run-O-Waters. Various references spell it with and without the hyphens, but Gareth's despised "f" has gone :-)