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alleyway

UK/ˈæ.li.weɪ/US/ˈæ.li.weɪ/
nounB1+Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #9,132 of 15,258neutral

Other forms: alleyways

An alleyway is a narrow passage between buildings. Down an alleyway, a dark alleyway, blocked the alleyway.

It is where bins, fire escapes and back doors live, and in fiction it is where people get followed. Alleyway and alley mean the same thing, with the longer word slightly more physical. On a ship an alleyway is a corridor below deck.

Rod Waddington from Kergunyah, Australia · CC BY-SA 2.0

Definitions of alleyway

  1. 1nounalleywayA narrow passage between buildings.B1+

    “The thief ran down a dark alleyway between the shops and disappeared.”

alleyway is a passage.

Where it comes from

From alley, from Old French alee, a walking or passage, from aler, to go, plus way.

From alley + way.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in In the City

Practise this word

alleyway in the wild

  • An alley or alleyway is a narrow lane, path, or passageway, often reserved for pedestrians, which usually runs between, behind, or within buildings in towns and cities.

    Alley

  • Volunteers clean the alleyways of San Francisco's Chinatown, organize monthly programs for seniors and children, and provide tours with Chinatown Alleyway Tours.

    Adopt-An-Alleyway Youth Empowerment Project

  • The original street of Sampheng, now officially known as Soi Wanit 1, is now a small alleyway lined with numerous shops, and is a famous market.

    Sampheng

  • The building is located along the south side of a gated alleyway which connects Frederiksholm Canal to Vester Voldgade.

    Royal Horse Guards Barracks (Copenhagen)

  • As a 12-year-old, she got a mention in the Berliner Zeitung for having kept an alleyway with steps in Altglienicke free of debris and weeds for years.

    Claudia Noack

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.