Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[learner1]

Hello,

"Excuse me, how can I get to the train station?"

Could we use 'reach' and 'arrive at' instead of 'get to' in the above sentence? e.g.

"Excuse me, how can I reach the train station?"

"Excuse me, how can I arrive at the train station?"

Thank you very much.

[cgage2]

They're ok but not often used in the US

[learner1]

Hello cgage2,

Thank you very much for your reply. You said 'reach' and 'arrive' aren't often used in US, Is it because they are more formal and not often used in conversaton? Is it more natural to use 'get to' here?

Thanks a lot.

[cgage2]

It's just the way that we say it. It's possible that a British person might say it the other ways. I'm not an expert on British English. They have a few words and expressions which are different. For example, an English person might say "whilst". You would never hear that in the US. We say, "while".