You are exactly right Stix[:$] Did know that, but confused it with the RRTF one. Made the proper correction on that.
TF
I grew up on Railway Road in Grand Falls, NL. The track for the Grand Falls Central Railway was right behind our house.
Scott
Besides Railroad / Railway Avenues, I’ve been in towns that had a Roundhouse Street or Road. I suspect in the midwest and west there are many streets and roads named after the railroad they were built next to, like Rock Island Avenue, Milwaukee St., Santa Fe Road, etc.
In Minneapolis, the street built parallel to the original Milwaukee Road St.Paul - Minneapolis line (where the light rail line is now from downtown Minneapolis to the Mall of America) is Hiawatha Avenue…although it was named long before the Milwaukee Road train was introduced in 1934. Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha” poem, set in this area, was very popular when Minneapolis was first founded right after the Civil War, and several place names are borrowed from the poem.
Looks like there was a railroad (or perhaps several railroads) that ran through Bedford, until 1977:
The abbreviation “No.” is most likely from the French ‘nombre’. That’s certainly where the serial number convention on watches derives from.
I’ve always suspected that a reason for “financially-stimulated” changing from railroad to railway or vice versa was that only one letter would need to be changed on all the printing plates for paperwork a given company would use, including the expensively-engraved stock certificates.
Number, in both French and Spanish is also ‘numero’.* I wouldn’t be surpised that the shortened version is ‘No’ in both languages.
“L’edifice No Un,” translates as, "Building #1). Numero uno is very likely to be understood by almost anybody.
Thanks for flagging the N&W. Never knew that and I model them!
I’m a little late to this topic, but my freelanced layout and username end with…[:)]
There was a very long, great, conversation on one of the FB prototype pages on the use of railroad vs railway. A couple of English professors soon joined the conversation and sorted things out pretty quickly. It seems that there are rules to using the word railway vs railroad such as “you work for the railway (company) but you work on the railroad” if you are actually working on the roadbed and/or associated infrastructure. There were plenty of other examples given as well on the use of RR terminology.
It all comes down to the local vernacular and let’s face it, how many people that name streets or companies or speak/write these days, think about the proper use of a language when it comes right down to it?
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If that was true, then the company names would all be “RAILWAY”, but that is not the case.
It seems the main difference is one is more British, and the other is more North American. Clearly not the case of people just not knowing the proper use of language.
The terms are synonomous.
I would never believe anything on facebook as a source of factual or logical information. Not even if 100 users pretend to be english professors.
[(-D]
-Kevin
I am not in a position to really give an opinion one way or another as my education is not advanced enough. But like what was stated in the conversation it comes down to the local vernacular.
There is an old line that always gave me a chuckle.
The Queen does not speak with an accent you do.[(-D]
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In Britain, the ‘railroad’ civil works are referred to as the ‘permanent way’ – there’s even a play about Hatfield with that name.
The English do not use the term ‘railroad’, perhaps because with granite blocks and fishbelly rails it’s no longer usable as a ‘road’. They also don’t use the term ‘rails’; they call them ‘metals’. If you have a link to the Facebook page please provide it, as I’d like to see the discussion – in the United States the terms are virtually synonymous in regular usage, but have a highly important distinction in corporate M&A.
The only things I can ever go back and find on FB are the things I participated in and I did not participate in that conversation as it was way above my pay grade. While I find FB a gold mine of info and photographs, I rarely enter the fray.
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Ya right, next you are going to tell me Fox news is not a pillar of truth.[swg][(-D]
Language has evolved since the beginning of time. One thing I have noticed about so many things in my life is there has been a correct way and an incorrect way, then one day the incorrect way becomes acceptable and eventually gets official recognition. To some who live by the formal, changes will always be unacceptable.
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Well there is no doubt that the Pennsylvania was a railroad. Their symbol is a keystone with an interlaced PRR in it
And to complicate the semantics, they started out as a literal road, single-track with passing sidings that anyone could run a wagon with appropriately-flanged wheels on. There was a post halfway between sidings, and a rule that the person ‘first to the post’ had the right to demand others to go back to the siding last passed – there were said to be horrific consequences when teamsters ‘laid on the leather’ to git thar fustest. Obviously this early attempt at a snakehead-prone National Road did not flourish very long…
Correct, it would come from latin according to this source:
https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/317797/why-is-number-abbreviated-as-no
Simon