redline
redline Lexical Profile
redline Game Scores & Validity
• verb
North American To refuse or limit loans, mortgages, insurance, or other financial services in specific neighborhoods based on the racial or socioeconomic composition of the residents.
"For decades, banks systematically redlined minority neighborhoods, depriving residents of homeownership opportunities."
To drive or operate an engine or vehicle at or beyond its maximum safe rotational speed.
"If you keep redlining that engine in second gear, you are going to blow a gasket."
To edit or mark up a document, contract, or architectural drawing by highlighting proposed insertions and deletions.
"Our attorneys redlined the draft agreement and returned it to the vendor for further negotiation."
• noun
The maximum safe operating speed of an internal combustion engine or aircraft, typically indicated by a red mark on a tachometer or airspeed indicator.
"The driver shifted gears just before the tachometer needle hit the redline."
A version of a legal, technical, or business document that displays tracked changes, deletions, and additions in red ink or colored text.
"Please send over the redline of the contract so our legal team can review your proposed edits."
• Rhymes for redline
Word Origin & Etymology
Coined in the 20th century as a compound of "red" and "line." The financial sense derives from the historical practice by lenders and government agencies of drawing red lines on maps to demarcate neighborhoods considered too risky for mortgage investment, while the mechanical sense refers to the red warning mark on an instrument gauge.