Word
Die U‑Bahn fährt schnell ins Zentrum.
Meaning
The subway travels quickly to the center.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Die U‑Bahn fährt schnell ins Zentrum.
schnell
quickly
fahren
to travel
in
to
das Zentrum
the center
Questions & Answers about Die U‑Bahn fährt schnell ins Zentrum.
What does U‑Bahn stand for, and why is it capitalized?
U‑Bahn is short for Untergrundbahn (“underground railway”). In German, all nouns—including parts of compound nouns—are always capitalized, so you write U‑Bahn with a capital U and B.
Why is the article die used before U‑Bahn?
In German every noun has a gender. U‑Bahn is a feminine noun, so it takes the feminine definite article die (nominative singular).
Why is the verb fährt used here instead of geht or läuft?
fahren is the verb for traveling by vehicle (car, train, subway, etc.). gehen and laufen mean “to go/walk” on foot. Since the subway is a vehicle, you always use fahren (conjugated as fährt for sie/er/es).
Is schnell an adjective or an adverb in this sentence?
Here schnell modifies the action fährt (how it travels), so it functions as an adverb. Adverbs describing manner in German remain in their base form, without adjective endings.
Why is it and not , and what case does take here?