due

Dear teachers,

I replied that I did and asked what time our train was due at Lyons.

a. expected b. arrived

The given answer is 'a'. No problem. Is 'b' possible?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.

Jiang

No.

:up:

jiang said:

Dear teachers,

I replied that I did and asked what time our train was due at Lyons.

a. expected b. arrived

The given answer is 'a'. No problem. Is 'b' possible?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.

Jiang

Click to expand...

No, but I presume you asked because you had heard someone use that verb. You could say '...what time is it due/scheduled to arrive' and if you are on it you can ask 'when does it [or 'do we'] arrive'. If you reported this, you could say (informally) 'I asked what time it was going to*/scheduled to/due to arrive.' (I don't know why you can't say 'arrived' there, but it does sound odd.)

b

* 'Going to' implies some confidence in the schedules. ;-)

jiang said:

Dear teachers,

I replied that I did and asked what time our train was due at Lyons.

a. expected b. arrived

The given answer is 'a'. No problem. Is 'b' possible?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.

Jiang

Click to expand...

"was arrived" is not grammatical.

Hi,

Thank you very much for your explanation.
The problem is "is expected at" is not grammatical, either.

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.
Jiang

jiang said:

Hi,

Thank you very much for your explanation.
The problem is "is expected at" is not grammatical, either.
Oh? Why do you say that?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.
Jiang

Click to expand...

That is not a problem - "is expected at" is grammatical.
More importantly:
"I ... asked what time our train was expected at Lyons" is grammatical, and
"I ... asked what time our train was arrived at Lyons" is not grammatical (in modern English).

"To be expected" is a correct verb form, but "to be arrived" is not.

Client: I would like to see Mr Smith.
Secretary: Are you expected? (Is Mr Smith expecting you?).

A: That lazy John failed his exam.
B: That was always to be expected.

- The train is expected at 9pm.
- Grammatical errors by non-native speakers are to be expected; they are expected.

Hi Raymott,

Thank you so much for your explanation.
May I say the meaning groups are "is expected" and "at Lyons"？ If so that means 'at' collocates with Lyons instead of 'expeted'?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.

Jiang

jiang said:

Hi Raymott,

Thank you so much for your explanation.
May I say the meaning groups are "is expected" and "at Lyons"？
I don't understand this question. What are "meaning groups?" Or, better still, can you ask the question using normal terminology?
If so that means 'at' collocates with Lyons instead of 'expeted'?

Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thank you in advance.

Jiang

Click to expand...

You have a sentence in reported speech, but I don't think this matters.
"I ... asked what time our train was expected at Lyons" (de-reported) => "What time is our train expected at Lyons?"
This means, "At what time is it expected that our train will arrive in Lyons?" or "When do you expect our train to arrive in Lyons?"

There's an ambiguity in some of these sentences which a native would not misunderstand.
The station master expects now that the train will arrive at 9pm. It is now expected that the train will arrive at 9pm.
If you ask the station master, "When do you expect the train to arrive at Lyons", he will not answer, "I've always expected it to arrive at Lyons eventually."
I hope this isn't your difficulty.

:up: It's conceivable, but not at all necessary, that there's someone with a stop-watch standing on the platform at Lyons, expecting it. ;-)

b