tube train

English

A tube train at Mornington Crescent station on the Northern Line.

Tube trains also come above ground outside inner London - three Jubilee Line trains wait at the Stratford terminus in 2016.

Etymology

Probably named after the shape of the tunnels; the Tube is an informal name for London Underground which has been trademarked.

Noun

tube train (plural tube trains)

1. (rail transport, UK) A smaller-profile underground train which operates through the tube tunnels under London, which have a small cross section.
   • 1979, The Boomtown Rats (lyrics and music), “Wind Chill Factor (Minus Zero)”, in The Fine Art of Surfacing:

     I took a tube train through the subway systems / I rode those tunnels like a six-foot mole

Usage notes

Tube trains are operated on the Bakerloo, Central, Jubilee, Northern, Piccadilly, Victoria and Waterloo & City Lines. The trains that operate on the Circle, District, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan Lines pass through larger tunnels and accordingly have a larger profile; these should be called underground trains, not "tube trains".

References

• “tube train”, in Collins English Dictionary.

Anagrams

• intratube, tribunate, turbinate