Re: Aussie railway slang

[Eddie Oliver <eoliver@efs.mq.edu.au>]

"Rod [comtrain]" wrote:
> 
> > It was interesting to note different meanings the Brits give to certain
> > words. For example, "peg" means a semaphore signal, whereas in Australia
> > it often refers to distance post.
> 
> David Bromage <dbromage@fang.omni.com.au> wrote in message
> xaIg6.24$WX1.2196@news0.optus.net.au">news:xaIg6.24$WX1.2196@news0.optus.net.au...
> 
> Never heard of that David!
> sure you are not confused a little there
> In my Railway Career, the slang word "peg" always referred to the "staff"

Maybe it depends on the people doing the talking. Terms like "quarter
mile peg" and more recently "kilometre peg" have always been relatively
common (at least in NSW) amongst track and structure people, and I would
have thought that they were at least understood by drivers etc. Moreover
there is no functional ambiguity between the meaning "distance post"
versus the meaning "token"; no one is going to interpret a "kilometre
peg" as a staff one kilometre long (an interesting concept!), nor is
anyone going to interpret "get the peg" as being an instruction to root
a distance post out of the ground.