1619 H. Hutton Follie's Anat. sig. A5^v Peruse my writ, And vse these Metroes of true meaning wit.

1619 H. Hutton Follie's Anat. sig. A6^v Nor in a Metro shew my Cupide's fire.

1904 A. Bennett Jrnl. (1932) I. 202 Wandering down through the Palais Royal and then taking the Métro.

1919 H. L. Mencken Amer. Lang. 110 In England..a subway is always a tube, or the underground, or the Metro.

1924 S. Story Dining in Paris 12 Business men, clerks, stockbrokers..have lit the eternal cigarette..before going to a restaurant for dinner or taking omnibus or ‘metro’ to their distant homes.

1927 W. E. Collinson Contemp. Eng. 66 Recently attempts have been made to put the short form metro [for the Underground railway in London] before the public.

1953 X. Fielding Stronghold iv. ii. 263 I realized why the ibex..smelt so strongly of the Paris métro.

1963 Listener 7 Mar. 418/1 It was in the way of a roundabout and the new metro [in Rotterdam].

1966 Listener 1 Dec. 801/1 The underground system..is called the métro, but, typical of bilingual Montreal, is more often referred to as the subway.

1973 National Geographic May 658/1 The Metro, Mexico's new subway system, is one of the wonders of the city.

1977 Time 28 Nov. 31/3 The canal that once passed along the quai has been replaced by a Métro station.

1991 F. Kanga Heaven on Wheels (1992) xii. 205 Simon had also been on the committee that planned the Newcastle metro.

1957 Maclean's 17 Aug. 3/3 Metro chairman..said a Bloor Street subway would be a mistake; Metro would study others.

1962 Time (Canad. ed.) 26 Jan. 10/2 Canada's second experiment with metropolitan government... The Metro [of Winnipeg] did not follow Toronto Metro's example.

1965 Economist 6 Feb. 544/2 ‘Metros’ (attempts to set up governments for metropolitan areas) [in the United States] are rare and usually ineffective.

1974 Harper's Mag. Dec. 15/1 Metro handles public transit, police, welfare, ambulance services, and housing for the elderly.

1988 Times of India 23 Feb. i. 1/4 Many of the rich youngsters in the metros have been abroad or have come in contact with the fashionable West.

2005 Pretoria News (S. Afr.) 4 Feb. 13/6 The bank would not stop funding the metros as they also serviced poor communities and loans to them were more profitable.

2009 Wall St. Jrnl. 31 Mar. a2/2 The medium-size metros that have done the blocking and tackling are better positioned during the downturn.

1957 Maclean's 17 Aug. 3/3 Metro chairman..said a Bloor Street subway would be a mistake; Metro would study others.

1963 J. N. Harris Weird World Wes Beattie (1964) xi. 138 The threat that the Metro Police would try it if the provincials didn't was sufficient to settle the matter.

1966 Globe & Mail (Toronto) 25 June 3/4 [He] faced an indirect challenge during the election campaign from a ginger group of eight Liberal in metro Winnipeg ridings.

1970 Toronto Daily Star 24 Sept. 35/2 (advt.) This outstanding offer is good in Metro Toronto only.

1976 Town & Country Jan. 99/1 The Valley of the Sun—Metro Phoenix—includes the satellite cities of Scottsdale, Paradise Valley, Tempe [etc.].

1986 N. King Big Sales from Small Spaces iv. 51 Known also as a ‘metro’ magazine, this regional type of publication is an excellent medium to use to target a specified geographical area with your message.

1988 1820 Found. Ann. Rev. (S. Afr.) 3 The language of Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton and Keats is likely..to take a few knocks from ‘township taal’ and ‘metro’ slang.

1991 Daily News (Durban, S. Afr.) 17 Dec. 21 The Metro Chamber experience..has drawn the Soweto Civic Association and other civics from around Johannesburg into close bargaining with four white municipalities, three black town councils and the Transvaal Provincial Administration.

2008 Chicago Tribune 15 Feb. (Midwest Final ed.) ii. 14/2 Early forecast trends suggest the metro area could sit astride the storm's so-called ‘rain/snow line’.