trolleybus

British

/ ˈtrɒlɪˌbʌs /

noun

an electrically driven public-transport vehicle that does not run on rails but takes its power from an overhead wire through a trolley

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

They were the original electric buses but 50 years ago today saw the plug pulled on the last trolleybus in Wales.

From BBC • Jan. 10, 2020

Metro maintains 70 miles of dual-wire trolleybus corridor, the second-largest system of just six in North America.

From Seattle Times • Aug. 27, 2018

“I’m singing the song on a tram in Melbourne, Australia, about a trolleybus ride I took with my late father Raymond in Reading, England, in 1964,” Hitchcock says.

From Salon • Apr. 8, 2017

“They’re building the underground very slowly; it’s an embarrassing tempo. Lines for buses, trolleybus and trams would be simpler, but these aren’t being built.”

From The Guardian • Mar. 23, 2016

I just bumped from my hotel to work and to parties and from parties to my hotel and back to work like a numb trolleybus.

From "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023