USAGE: subway

On Mon, 7 Apr 2003, Pavel Iosad wrote:

> Also the name of a subway station ;-) though it's not exactly *sub*way
> right there ;-)
What, then, is the difference between a subway in the train sense and a
suburban train? I've always understood the American sense of 'subway'*
just to refer to an undeground train system (our underground system is
called the loop, generally, as it completes the city loop. It's
only three stations).

* Here, 'subway' generally refers to a *pedestrian* crossing beneath the
train tracks. (There are exceptions, of course, found in fixed phrases,
like the Degraves St Subway, which goes from Flinders St Station to the
other side of Flinders St and continues a bit under Degraves St. It's
essentially an underground arcade in the sense of a bunch of shops with a
pedestrian walkway (a bit like a mall in the sense of a road closed off,
except it's covered, never was a road, and so generally smaller. No, that
does not make it like a mall in the American sense, or maybe it is, but
not the normal sense).) Having tried to explain that, and knowing it's
probably going to be horribly mashed, I'm going to say I'm horribly
disappointed in you Americans, can't you speak normally like the rest of
us? (Read that knowing full well that the Author knows there's 19.5
million people who speak the way he does and at least 260 million who
speak the way Americans do.)



--
Tristan                  <kesuari@...>

War doesn't prove who's right, just who's left.
                      - fortune.

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