[Ads-l] surface roads/streets

[Laurence Horn]

And then (now) there's the High Line, which is neither a surface street nor
a highway.  Nor, depending on your definition, a street period.

On Mon, Sep 12, 2022 at 4:32 PM Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com> wrote:

> My understanding was always that surface line was used in the rail/trolley
> biz in NYC back in the 19th century, and surface street was used as a
> retronym contrast to highways right from the conception of highways.
>
> Google has a map with a fragment view that mentions "Manhattan surface
> streets" in a 1937 doc about the Queens-Midtown Tunnel (opened in 1940).
>
> On Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:19 PM Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > When is a street ever a freeway??
> >
> > On Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 12:55 PM Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On the latest episode of "That's What They Say" from Michigan Public
> Radio
> >> (featuring Univ. of Michigan's Anne Curzan), they discuss a listener's
> >> question about the expression "surface roads" or "surface streets."
> >>
> >>
> >>
> https://www.michiganradio.org/podcast/thats-what-they-say/2022-09-11/twts-beneath-the-surface-road
> >>
> >> Anne notes that "surface road" started out with the meaning given in
> >> Random
> >> House Unabridged (and still on Dictionary.com): "a road or street level
> >> with its surroundings," as in "surface roads and elevated highways." OED
> >> defines "surface road" as "a road running along the surface of the
> ground,
> >> as distinct from one which is elevated or underground," with the note,
> "In
> >> early use applied to railroads; now more usually to roads for motor
> >> vehicles."
> >>
> >> As the listener observes, "surface roads" are now contrasted with
> >> "highways." Anne says the meaning is "out there" but "you won't find it
> in
> >> dictionaries yet." She cites an example from the US version of "The
> >> Office"
> >> where a character who is supposed to be driving to the hospital asks,
> >> "Highways or surface roads?"
> >>
> >> Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/surface_street) doesn't have
> >> an
> >> entry for "surface road" but it does have "surface street" with the
> newer
> >> meaning: "A street that is not a freeway and has at-grade intersections
> >> with other surface streets."
> >>
> >> I associate this meaning of "surface street" with Los Angeles
> especially,
> >> and sure enough, the databases take it way back in L.A. papers, with
> >> "surface streets" contrasting with "freeways." Here it is from 1941 when
> >> the freeway system was in its planning stages:
> >>
> >> ---
> >> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109416009/surface-streets/
> >> Los Angeles Times, Aug. 19, 1941, p. 1, col. 8
> >> "Need to Build Freeways Stressed at Hearing"
> >> Members of the City Council's public works and State and county affairs
> >> committees yesterday opened their public hearing on the City Planning
> >> Commission's request for adoption of a system of 200 miles of freeways
> in
> >> the city as part of the master plan for Los Angeles... Glenn A. Rick,
> >> director of city planning, explained the program as one contemplating a
> >> modern parkway system to handle the needs of the growing city and
> declared
> >> the time had passed for handling city traffic by congested surface
> >> streets.
> >> ---
> >>
> >> It's possible that early freeway planners envisioned an elevated system,
> >> which would provide an obvious contrast to "surface" roads/streets. In
> any
> >> case, by the '60s, the "freeway"/"surface street" distinction was very
> >> common in SoCal, e.g.:
> >>
> >> ---
> >> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109415852/surface-streets/
> >> Long Beach Press-Telegram, Oct. 25, 1968, p. 25, col. 5
> >> You may feel you’re taking your life in your hands every time you drive
> on
> >> the freeway, but your chances of being killed are actually much greater
> on
> >> surface streets.
> >> ---
> >>
> >> It's surprising that none of the major dictionaries have picked up on
> this
> >> now-established meaning of "surface road/street."
> >>
> >> --bgz
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org