In article
,
"Lüko Willms" wrote:

Am Wed, 25 Mar 2009 23:00:40 UTC, schrieb "John Salmon"
auf uk.railway :

"Lüko Willms" wrote
DB could do what you formulate in your question above, or they could
simply dispend of ICRR and manage the Eurostar traffic on Great
Britain themselves,

Er, we've been here before... it's *in* Great Britain to everyone here

Great Britain is an island.

In case you go to vacations to the largest of the Balearen islands,
would you spend your time _on_ Mallorca, or _in_ Mallorca?

We'd say "in Mallorca" (actually we'd say "in Majorca" but we'd
pronounce it as if it were a German word!). We'd say "in Ireland" too.
We generally reserve "on" for islands you can see most of at the same
time: on the Isle of Wight, on Arran, on Lindisfarne, on Barra. We
might use "in" for islands that are also states of some kind so you
could use either "in" or "on" for the Isle of Man or Jersey. The phrase
"in the island of Ireland" is common but then so is "on the island of
Ireland".

It's pretty weird.

Sam

Sam Wilson wrote:

We'd say "in Mallorca" (actually we'd say "in Majorca" but we'd
pronounce it as if it were a German word!). We'd say "in Ireland"
too. We generally reserve "on" for islands you can see most of at the
same time: on the Isle of Wight, on Arran, on Lindisfarne, on Barra.
We might use "in" for islands that are also states of some kind so you
could use either "in" or "on" for the Isle of Man or Jersey. The
phrase "in the island of Ireland" is common but then so is "on the
island of Ireland".

Size is irrelevant IMO. I find that if it's a country, you say "in",
otherwise you say "on". I would certainly say "on South Island" (NZ), "on
Baffin Island" and "on Hokkaido", even though these islands are way too big
to see the whole thing at the same time.

On Thu, 26 Mar 2009 11:30:10 +0000, Sam Wilson
wrote:

It's pretty weird.

And you travel "on the train", though you might find you got a belt
from the overhead lines if you actually did!

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Thu, 26 Mar 2009, John Rowland wrote:

Sam Wilson wrote:

We'd say "in Mallorca" (actually we'd say "in Majorca" but we'd
pronounce it as if it were a German word!). We'd say "in Ireland"
too. We generally reserve "on" for islands you can see most of at the
same time: on the Isle of Wight, on Arran, on Lindisfarne, on Barra.
We might use "in" for islands that are also states of some kind so you
could use either "in" or "on" for the Isle of Man or Jersey. The
phrase "in the island of Ireland" is common but then so is "on the
island of Ireland".

Size is irrelevant IMO. I find that if it's a country, you say "in",
otherwise you say "on". I would certainly say "on South Island" (NZ),
"on Baffin Island" and "on Hokkaido", even though these islands are way
too big to see the whole thing at the same time.

On Eurasia? That's an island too.

I think to an extent it depends about whether you're talking about the
island as a political or geological unit. You're in a polity, but on a
rock.

tom

--
But for [Flavor Flav's] "YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAH BOYYYYYYYYYY"s alone he should
be given Rap Legend status. -- Nate Patrin, ILX

On Mar 26, 1:58*pm, (Neil Williams)
wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2009 11:30:10 +0000, Sam Wilson
wrote:

It's pretty weird.

And you travel "on the train", though you might find you got a belt
from the overhead lines if you actually did!

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

And on the airplane [sic.] as George Carlin pointed out.

On Mar 26, 2:14*pm, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2009, John Rowland wrote:
Sam Wilson wrote:

We'd say "in Mallorca" (actually we'd say "in Majorca" but we'd
pronounce it as if it were a German word!). *We'd say "in Ireland"
too. We generally reserve "on" for islands you can see most of at the
same time: on the Isle of Wight, on Arran, on Lindisfarne, on Barra.
We might use "in" for islands that are also states of some kind so you
could use either "in" or "on" for the Isle of Man or Jersey. *The
phrase "in the island of Ireland" is common but then so is "on the
island of Ireland".

Size is irrelevant IMO. I find that if it's a country, you say "in",
otherwise you say "on". I would certainly say "on South Island" (NZ),
"on Baffin Island" and "on Hokkaido", even though these islands are way
too big to see the whole thing at the same time.

On Eurasia? That's an island too.

I think to an extent it depends about whether you're talking about the
island as a political or geological unit. You're in a polity, but on a
rock.

tom

--
But for [Flavor Flav's] "YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAH BOYYYYYYYYYY"s alone he should
be given Rap Legend status. -- Nate Patrin, ILX- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text

This is probably right up to a point, but this doesn't tell us what to
do when (1) a polity and an an island are coterminus, and (2) the
speaker doesn't want explicitly to refer to one or another. There
then doesn't seem to be a general rule: upthread it was suggested that
one might holiday on the Isle of White, but in Majorca. That sounds
right to me. In this case, I suspect that one uses on for the Isle
of White precisely because the word Isle is in the name, but I'm far
from convinced that this is a general rule.

--- Bill.

Roland Perry wrote:

BA own 10% of Eurostar UK. I don't know what proportion of the Eurostar
trains are operated by Eurostar UK (rather than the equivalent Belgian
and French companies), but all the ones I get to/from Brussels seem to
have French speaking crew.

That's odd. One wouldn't expect the Belgian Railways to solely put
French speaking crew on their Eurostars...

In message , at 07:33:48 on Fri, 27 Mar
2009, "/" remarked:
BA own 10% of Eurostar UK. I don't know what proportion of the
Eurostar trains are operated by Eurostar UK (rather than the
equivalent Belgian and French companies), but all the ones I get
to/from Brussels seem to have French speaking crew.

That's odd. One wouldn't expect the Belgian Railways to solely put
French speaking crew on their Eurostars...

Even the front of house staff at St Pancras are predominantly French
speakers, as far as I can tell (I changed a ticket at the office, tried
to buy a Brussels metro card at the enquiries desk in the departure
lounge, etc). Their English varies from good to gruesome (but is better
then my French, so I can't complain).
--
Roland Perry