taxicabn.
/ˈtaksɪkab/, U.S. /ˈtæksiˌkæb/ A motor car fitted with a taximeter and licensed to transport passengers to destinations of their choice in return for payment of a fare. Cf. cab n.2, taxi n.
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society > travel > means of travel > a conveyance > vehicle > vehicles (plying) for hire > [noun] > taxi
cab1882
taximeter cab1898
taximeter1899
taxi1907
taxicab1907
special hire1950
1907 Observer 24 Mar. 5/3 The ‘taxicabs’ are as comfortable and convenient as a private motor-car.
1978 M. Gilbert Empty House xii. 102 An aged taxi-cab parked in the [station] forecourt.
2013 C. LeDuff Detroit 185 An old Checker taxicab, the big curvy kind you see in old New York movies.
Compounds
C1. As a modifier, as in taxicab door, etc.; also with agent nouns, verbal nouns, and adjectives, forming compounds in which taxicab expresses the object of the underlying verb, as in taxicab driver, etc.
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1907 Daily Mail 27 Mar. 3/3 (heading) Taxicab finance.
1933 S. Walker Night Club Era 101 The siren call of a taxicab driver who said, ‘Want to meet some nice girls, buddy?’
1947 J. Douglas No Navel to guide Him 72 Thaddeus called the man a vile name with his index finger. The driver promptly slammed the taxicab door on it, and to this day that finger has a slight lisp.
2011 Vanity Fair Apr. 172/1 He was fascinated by the haiku of taxicab communication—the way drivers and dispatchers succinctly convey locations by radio.
C2.
taxicab yellow n. and adj. (a) n. a bright warm yellow colour, such as that used on taxicabs in various cities, but particularly associated with those in New York City; (b) adj. of this colour.
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1928 East Berlin (Pa.) News 28 Sept. 1/5 The lower part of the body will be a taxicab yellow, then a 6-inch panel of cream with a green moulding.
1951 N.Y. Times 8 Aug. 22/3 Cloth coats were of shaggy fleeces in taxi cab yellow or smoky, linty gray.
2014 E. Kolbert Sixth Extinction i. 4 The golden frog, which is taxicab yellow with dark brown splotches, is endemic to the area around El Valle. It is considered a lucky symbol in Panama.
C3. Mathematics. Denoting or relating to a method of measuring the distance between two points (see taxicab metric n.).
taxicab distance n. the taxicab metric; (also) a distance calculated using this metric.
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1962 R. A. Struble Nonlinear Differential Equations i. 35 This particular norm has been given the very descriptive name taxicab length or distance, since relative to this norm, distance is accrued along rectangular (i.e. piece-wise rectilinear) paths.
2015 D. Poole Linear Algebra (ed. 4) vii. 529 Therefore, the taxicab distance from A to B is 5.
taxicab geometry n. a system of geometry in which use of the taxicab metric replaces the usual method of calculating distances in a Euclidean space.
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1952 K. Menger You will like Geom. 5 In the Taxicab Geometry, between two intersections, C and D, (D two blocks East and two blocks North of C) each path is at least a half mile long.
2018 M. T. Carroll & E. Rykken Geom. v. 101 All of Euclid's axioms are valid in Taxicab geometry.
taxicab metric n. a metric (metric n.1 3) in which the distance between two points is defined as the sum of the absolute differences of their coordinates. [So called with reference to the distance travelled on a journey along roads arranged in a grid. Compare earlier taxicab geometry n.]
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1968 Q. Appl. Math. 26 208 In Rn1 (3) is the L1-norm or the ‘taxicab metric’ approximation problem.
2011 G. Belot Geom. Possibilities i. 23 It is not hard to see that the plane equipped with the taxi-cab metric is not a Riemannian manifold.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2019; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1907