tram

Meaning

Noun

1. (Australia, British) A passenger vehicle for public use that runs on tracks in the road (called a streetcar or trolley in North America).
2. A similar vehicle for carrying materials.
3. (US) A people mover.
4. (US) An aerial cable car.
5. (US) A train with wheels that runs on a road; a trackless train.
6. (British, historical) A car on a horse railway or tramway (horse trams preceded electric trams).
7. (obsolete) The shaft of a cart.
8. (obsolete) One of the rails of a tramway.

Verb

1. (intransitive) To operate, or conduct the business of, a tramway.
2. (intransitive) To travel by tram.
3. (transitive) To transport (material) by tram.
4. (US, transitive) To align a component in mechanical engineering or metalworking, particularly the spindle of a mill or drill press, as historically accomplished using a trammel.

Verb

To weave in this manner.

Synonyms

streetcar

tramcar

trolley

tramway

trolley car

cable car

streetcar

cable tramway

aerial tramway

ropeway

cart

railway

motor-car

motor vehicle

private car

retinue

single-minded

street car

tram-car

tram-line

trammel

trolleybus

🚎

trolley-bus

voice mail

wain

municipal railway

city streetcar

tram car

auto mechanic

trackless trolley

light rail

🚈

electric trolley

light-rail vehicle

tramcar

trolley

trolley car

light-rail vehicle

Wain

light rail

🚈

auto

automobile

bus

🚌

car

🚗

chariot

electric car

instrument

jamjar

lorry

motorcar

motor car

Translations

tramway

🚊

Straßenbahn

tram

🚊

tranvía

🚊

tram

🚊

tram

🚊

τραμ

tramvia

🚊

bonde

Tram

🚊

tramvay

eléctrico

ترام

🚊

tranvai

🚊

Pronounced as (IPA)

/tɹæm/

Etymology

Cognate with Latin: terminus

Cognate with Middle Low German: treme

Cognate with West Flemish: traam

In summary

Early 16th century, borrowed from Scots, probably from Low German traam (“tram, shaft of a barrow”), from Middle Low German and Middle Dutch trame (“narrow shaft, beam”), said to be ultimately from a lost West Germanic (Ingvaeonic) word, probably from Proto-Germanic *drum (“splinter, fragment”), from Proto-Indo-European *térmn̥ (“peg, post, boundary”), cognate with Latin terminus.
Compare Middle Low German treme; West Flemish traam, trame.
The popular derivation from the surname of the English pioneer tramway builder Benjamin Outram (1764–1805) is false: the term pre-dated him.
The sense of a rail vehicle derives from tram-way, in its earliest sense meaning literally a log-covered road, but later applied to the earliest wooden railways, used for transporting coal in carts which came to be called "trams".