Word of the Day

: January 10, 2017

jitney

noun JIT-nee

What It Means

1 : a small bus that carries passengers over a regular route on a flexible schedule

2 : an unlicensed taxicab

jitney in Context

After doing some shopping along the boardwalk, we boarded a jitney whose route took us back to our hotel.

"Another option, especially if you're staying along Cable Beach or areas west, is to hop a ride on the jitneys into and out of Downtown Nassau, a great way to chat with locals who are doing the same thing (each ride is about $1.50)." — Kaeli Conforti, BudgetTravel.com, 14 Nov. 2016

Did You Know?

Jitneys weren't worth a dime—just a nickel. In the early 1900s, jitney was slang for "nickel," but it wasn't long before the term was applied to a new mode of public transportation that only cost a nickel. When they were introduced in American cities at the beginning of the century, vehicular jitneys could be any automobiles that carried passengers over a set route for a cheap fare, but eventually the term was applied specifically to small buses—and, nowadays, to the motor shuttles used by airlines and hotels). In the mid-1900s, the word jitney was combined with jeep to create a new coinage: jeepney, meaning "a Philippine jitney bus converted from a jeep."