runway

A runway is the long flat strip at an airport where planes speed up to take off and slow down after landing. Land on the runway, a second runway, the runway was closed.

It is the technical word: the taxiway leads to it and the apron is where planes park. Runways are numbered by their compass direction, which is why you hear runway two-seven. In fashion, the runway is the raised walkway models walk along — catwalk is the usual British word for the same thing. Note runway model and, in aviation, the phrase runway incursion, meaning something on the runway that should not be.