Coachload

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The full load of passengers that a single coach or bus is able to carry on one journey
2. The number of people that fill a coach to capacity during a trip
3. The complete group of travelers transported together in one coach at a time

Etymology: "Coachload" is about as transparent as English compounds get: it joins "coach," a large passenger vehicle, with "load," the quantity carried. The coach half carries its own history. The word came into English in the 1500s for a horse-drawn carriage, named after the Hungarian town of Kocs, where such vehicles were reportedly built, and it was only in the twentieth century that it shifted to mean the long-distance motor bus. Once the vehicle sense was settled, "load" slotted in naturally, and "coachload" came to describe the number of people a single bus or coach could hold on a journey. It is most often heard in phrases like "a coachload of tourists," where the word measures a group by the vehicle that moved it.

Synonyms: busload