Word.ws English Dictionary

fourth rails

fourth rails is the plural of fourth rail.

Meaning of fourth rail

Noun

fourth rail (plural fourth rails)

  1. An extra rail in addition to the third rail (live rail) which is used for current return purposes, mainly by London Underground, because of problems caused by using the running rails for current return underground.
    • It was the only line to operate by means of the third-rail system (as distinct from the fourth-rail system now universal on all London's Underground railways) and its coaches were of different design and appearance from those on other systems.1948 January and February, C. R. L. Coles, “The Grouping Era”, in Railway Magazine, page 21

Questions about fourth rails

What is fourth rails the plural of?
Fourth rails is the plural of fourth rail.

Words near fourth rails in the dictionary

  1. fourth person
  2. fourth point of contact
  3. fourth points of contact
  4. fourth position
  5. fourth rail
  6. fourth rails
  7. fourth rate
  8. fourth rates
  9. Fourth Reich
  10. Fourth Republic
  11. Fourth Siding

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fourth rails (page history and authors); fourth rail (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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