section_path: Etymology
section_name: Etymology
paragraph_text: Etymology
  
  The word "infrastructure" has been used in French since 1875 and in English since 1887, originally meaning "installations that form the basis for any operation or system". It is a loanword from French, where it was already used for establishing a roadbed of substrate material, required before railroad tracks or constructed pavement could be laid on top of it. The word is a combination of the Latin prefix infra-, meaning "below", as many of these constructions are underground (for example, tunnels, water and gas systems, and railways), and the French word structure. The army use of the term achieved currency in the United States after the formation of NATO in the 1940s, and by 1970 was adopted by urban planners in its modern civilian sense.