Lawrence, it's funny because to hear most Europeans talk, there is no such thing as a suburb outside of North America. Of course we all know that's not correct. 🙂 I have no idea what we call that thing between the sidewalk and the pavement here in the SF Bay Area....I can't think of anyone referring specifically to that. But I'll go with "mow strip" since apparently you saw it somewhere, lol 🙂
Laurence, I don't have that "grassy area" where I live, just a huge front "lawn" (garden). But ive heard people call it "the city strip" cause the city that I live in is in charge of keeping it clean and mowed. I guess it just depends on where you live. Ive had to call my city's Maint. dept and tell them that the main road I live off of needed to have the trash picked up & mowed & also when a dead tree was abt to fall in the street. Btw, it was nice to see Arthur again, hes such a happy bouncy puppy. The reason ppl want to speak to other ppl that have puppies is cause we know they must have a good heart if they love puppies/dogs. Make sense? We know that we have one thing in common and that's our love of dogs. Have you ever heard about the guys who get dog walking jobs so they can meet girls, cause girls see them as sensitive and caring. ❤
Neutral Ground isn't the bit of grass between sidewalk and street - in Louisiana, it's the grass in the middle of a street that has that kind of divisor in the middle. In eastern PA, it's "median". 32 yrs in southeastern PA (Philly suburbs) , never called that grass strip a "berm" - it was a curb strip. In Texas now for 25 yrs, and I haven't had to bother naming it because it doesn't exist in 3/4s of the suburbs. It's just yard, then street. Boom. No sidewalks. Safety? Pfft! (I mean, look at TX gun laws SIGH). But berms are slopes next to highways.
I live in western Pennsylvania and I always call the strip of grass between the street and the sidewalk ... "the strip of grass between the street and the sidewalk".
In the USA, the word "garden" typically refers specifically to a plot planted with vegetables. (*or flowers*) So we might have both a "yard" and a "garden".
@@ferretyluvflowers and ornamental plants is the first thing that comes to my mind as an American hearing "garden", more so than vegetables. Not everyone grows food at their house but most people have at least some strip of dirt where they grow plants that they like and pull "weeds" that they don't like.
Yeah, Midwestern USA a garden is any part of a residential property for either food (mostly vegetables) or ornamental plants are grown. I recall being thrown off by some British novels I read as a kid. They'd have descriptions of playing in the garden, which knowing gardens as non playing areas made no sense until I learned the British definition.
my parents in iowa called it "city easement" or just "easement" because of how much control the city has for that space between sidewalk and street. the mantra was "the city owns that spot but you have to take care of it."
Yes, in Iowa it I call it an Easement. When I lived in Denver, I used the same word and nobody ever questioned it, or made fun of me. 😅 I've also heard right-of-way used.
I’ve always called it an easement, because while the homeowner owns it and is responsible for it, the city holds an easement from the curb to the house side of the sidewalk. This prevents a homeowner from making a legal claim to deny access to the sidewalk to pedestrians.
I thought the homeowner had an easement, meaning they were allowed to use it to access their property even though it is city property…sometimes also used for driveways that are shared between multiple homes.
My grandma also called it an easement. (north central WI) I thought the city did own that strip of land but homeowners were responsible for taking care of it? Whatever way it works it's confusing.
@@TimothyReeves in most cities, the property owner owns the land. The tax records will define it in any case. Shared driveways can also constitute an easement, but that’s a minefield I would never enter by buying a house with a shared driveway. Also when you have buried utilities (phone, power, cable, etc) in either the front or back yard, the utility companies maintain an easement to access their facilities.
Haha! I’m a traffic engineer that used to work in the UK. When writing my first report I used “verge” and my boss asked what that meant. I had to replace it with “grassy strip next to the road”. 😅Swales are usually verges that collect rainwater, and berms are a verge that is mounded up.
So interesting to hear the correct info and your insight on this! It never fails to amaze me how something as innocuous as the name for a strip of land can be so varied from one place to another lol. Thank you for commenting 😀
A swale is a type of drainage area or piece of land that has a dip in it. A berm is a built up area higher than the land around it usually used to protect from flooding or other items.
As a law enforcement traffic homicide investigator for a couple of decades, the difference depended on how the strip of grass was separated from the road surface. If there was a curb, it was a parkway…if not, a swale. I think this is found in the USDOT Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices…or maybe somewhere else. It’s been too long, but some things just stick with you.
I call it "the other side of the sidewalk" ... and this year my city planted more than a hundred trees in my neighborhood in that zone and I got a 10 foot tall oak. I'm so happy about it that I had to share.
You don't have to take GOOD care of the tree they forced upon you. And WHO has to repair the damage the tree makes as it overgrows that too-slim space? Certainly not the city, I bet. It's a form of taxation without representation -- or consultation or consideration.
The Werefrog got the electric company to remove the trees in that area for free. Yelled at them for not sending the insurance proof of their tree remover people: the one condition to allow them on the lawn. They offered to remove entirely, and The Werefrog took them up on it. Then yelled at them for remaining mess. They came out and cleaned it up.
@@jerelull9629it’s not taxation without representation - you can literally email your representation in local, state, and even federal, to voice your disagreement. Unless it was put in after you moved to the house without your consent it is just another expense of owning that house. If you don’t like it, don’t buy a house that has it.
I didn't know they had names, either. In Louisiana and Texas, I've always considered it part of the front yard. Some houses, streets, and neighborhoods don't even have sidewalks.
Man...I've lived in suburbs most of my life (excluding 12 years in New York City), and I utterly and completely had no idea that strip of grass next to the sidewalk even HAD a name...let alone dozens! I learn something every day, and often from Lawrence!
I grew up in Southern Connecticut which is the NY tri-state area, and New England at the same time, and I've never heard most of these terms... if I had to name it I'd have said 'median.'
@@masterofallgoons but “median” is that bit of sidewalk in the middle of a road. Being from MA, never once have I heard a name for that strip of grass next to the sidewalk. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone refer to is separately from just the yard.
@@Diphenhydra - yeah 'median' or 'island' is usually what I'd say or hear for that, but like I said, if I had to name that bit of grass I'd probly have said 'median' .. but I've never heard it named before... but I was surprised to hear him say 'median' was a pacific northwest thing
I live in Louisville, KY and have always called the area between the sidewalk and the road/street the easement. The area in the middle of the road - dividing the two sides of the road is what we call the median.
The median here usually has flowers and bushes too. They are maintained by the city. The city I used to live in had 2 with waterfalls that we referred to as free car washes.
It is also common to call it a median in Cleveland, Ohio too. Easement was the only other term I recognised for tree lawn. I literally had to wait through most of the bit to understand what he was referring to because I was unfamiliar with any of the other 15 terms. I had no idea America was so divided! 😂
I am from Cleveland, OH and we call that strip of grass a Tree Lawn. That is where the city plants the city trees. The city owns the street, the Tree Lawn, the tree, and the sidewalk, however, it is the homeowner's responsibility to mow the Tree Lawn and shovel the sidewalk.
We Southerners would say shovel the snow from the sidewalk if it ever happened. That would probably be once every other leap year. Come to think of it, even when it snows here it melts the next day by 10:00 am.
It's hard to compare British suburbs to American suburbs, because there are huge regional differences. Regarding how green everything is, keep in mind that much of the US is at the latitude of Portugal and Spain. I've noticed that the color of the sky and trees is more intense, due to the sun being more direct.
We lived in Ann Arbor for over 20 years, and I never once heard the term extension lawn. We always called it an easement and yes, our current easement does contain a large tree.
To me it is the place where the snow from the road gets piled up. In really snowy places it becomes a wall separating the sidewalk canyon from the road.
We've always called it an easement. A lot of rural neighborhoods don't have sidewalks, but there is almost always an easement where permanent structures can't be built that the city/county can use for utilities at their will. I've never thought to call it anything else as it was at least descriptive for it's practical use.
Here in western Canada, we call the verge a boulevard. A major reason for them, is for the depositing of snow in the winter. The boulevards get snow piled on them by the snow plows. This keeps both the roads and the sidewalks useable without having to truck the snow away. Same reason for the street signs being up higher. Signs mounted on a low wall would be obscured by corner snow piles. It’s all very practical.
I'm going to just say it. Calling it a boulevard seems very odd. I grew up living along a boulevard, but it was a kind of street. This is particularly odd because even though the definition of a boulevard is a type of broad avenue planted with rows of trees, the boulevard that I grew up on had very few trees and did not have a strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street.
My experience here in Canada is that roads are built in the center of a 66 foot right of way which is public land (66 feet was the length of 1 surveyors chain ) now days electric, TV cable and internet wires or old land line phone wires are buried under the boulevard ,the pavement usually is 25 to 30 feet of the 66 foot right of way
I have never called the strip between the sidewalk and the road anything other than "the other side of the sidewalk" while being vaguely annoyed I have to mow it even though I don't technically own it. I'm from Pennsylvania, and I always thought 'berm' was specifically an inclined patch of grass near a ditch that came next to a road. So thanks for teaching me something new today!
Yikes! Where I grew up the median was what separated the two traffic lanes on the right side from the two traffic lanes on the left side. Flowers and bushes were often planted in the median (or median strip). It made for a lovely drive on the boulevard. At least, that's what I thought they were talking about...
In my part of N. America, a berm is a raised bank bordering a watercourse. And a swale is a shallow linear drainage channel with gently sloping sides. May be only seasonally filled with water. I used to work in urban topographical mapping for civil infrastructure development when young.
I'm from VA and NC, and agree with the OP. And yes. The "median" separates lanes of traffic going in opposite directions. Median = middle. And I agree with Michael Dowson on berm. But isn't a berm on a golf course too? I don't play golf and only watch it when I'm visiting my dad and he's watching it.
As a lifelong Pacific Northwesterner, I didn't know the lawn on the other side of the sidewalk had a name. I always just called it "the lawn on the other side of the sidewalk." Then again, I've only once briefly lived in a place that had them. Mostly I've lived in rural areas where there's no sidewalks and just a drainage ditch between lawn and road, or fields or woods instead of lawns.
Native PNW here as well, and in 60 years I never lived anywhere that had one. Now we live in Kansas, and don’t have one here either, although there IS one on the other side of the street. I’ve never called it anything because I’ve never had a need to name it. 🤷🏻♀️ As for “median,” that’s the bit between lanes in the middle of the street or freeway.
Huh, I call it a boulevard. I'm in North Dakota, but haven't always been. I just don't think I had any need to name that until I moved here. I'd never had one before. I'm fascinated.
@@sabatoa These are the two I'm most familiar with. I've heard verge, but I don't recall what state I was in. I'd no idea there were so many names for it!
The strip of grass in the center of the street is the median. Between the sidewalk and street is called an easement. You would probably find that there is utilities equipment buried there, such as water, sewer and gas lines.
I'm fascinated by all the terms you used to describe the bit of grass between the street and sidewalk. I have to confess I don't think I've ever heard it referred to as anything at all. I mean it's there and people know it's there, but I just don't remember anyone calling it anything. I'd never even considered that it had a name or ever even wondered if it did. I'd be up all night thinking about it except that it's already after 1 in the morning and I probably won't be able to stay awake much longer thinking about anything.
Oh good. I'm not the only one. I did not hear anything familiar as he was suggesting names. I've lived in Ohio, California (LA & San Diego) and now Wisconsin.
I was born and raised in California and today was the first time that I'd ever considered the possibility that the bit of lawn on the other side of the sidewalk had its own name.
It's referred to as a parkway in Chicago. As for the tree; dig out grass in a box shape 1-2 feet around the tree. You can put in wood chips but leaving it dirt is actually easier to pull or weed wack any grass or weeds that grow. Makes mowing easier and it doesn't look as bad as you think. Looks pretty nice if you upkeep it.
I was waiting for parkway to be mentioned. I’m surprised he didn’t mention it since he lives here… I grew up in the Chicago suburbs and only heard parkway or sometimes easement.
@@cobrakai3732I feel like Easement is the legal term for the ownership of the plot. Its a parkway to me, but given that we don't own it, it functions as public land used for access. I have a river behind my house and there is a similar strip of land along it also classed as and easement that the DNR can use.
@@bobnewkirk7003 easement is if you own the property. Typically in Chicago your property line will end somewhere on the sidewalk. Then the other half of the sidewalk to the curb is the parkway. Most people will maintain it but I think legally it's only if it's a multifamily 3+ that you are required to maintain. Also, the city just recently put in place a new plan to take care of the trees. Instead of having to call in they will work in zones and inspect/take care of them. Every three years they'll make the rounds to each tree.
I kept thinking what I remember my parents using just wasn't coming up. I couldn't remember what it was but none of those. I now clearly remember it being "parking".
I’ve lived in the suburbs almost my entire life, except for my first five years when I lived across the street from a suburb in Chicago. In my Chicago suburb, we call that strip of grass a parkway, and the reason the dogs do their business on it is that generally it is part of the right of way of the street, not private property. Trees in my neighborhood are quite gren, as long as they last, because unfortunately, the trees in my neighborhood are old and huge, and storms take them out occasionally.
Being a New Englander, a "common" is a town square/public green space that used to be used for "common" grazing of livestock. Now, they are used for gatherings for town events. We don't really have a name for that public grassy area between the public sidewalk and the road, although I have heard it called a verge. FYI: pavement is what we call the tar and gravel on the road it's self.
Being British by origin, I'm surprised Lawrence didn't realize this. In South Africa, we have commons as well, and I'm sure we got it from the British.
Agreed, in my part of New England we don't really have many of these. We just call it "the sidewalk grass" in the places we see it. Honestly I can't think of when I'd use the term unless I was filling out a police report or insurance affidavit.
I have lived in both New Mexico & Texas all my life, and I can tell you the greenness of trees varies in the US too. As a child when I saw photos other places, I thought they were editing the color of the trees. Turns out, no, trees elsewhere can be at least twice as green as they are in New Mexico. It has something to do with temperature and/or water.
Hi Lawrence, thanks for your nice video! I don't live in either UK nor US, but do find cultural differences and similarities interesting. I'm a Dutch biologist, so there's two reactions I have. You are pretty close to why American leaves can be more vibrantly green. For being in more shaded circumstances most of the time UK plants need to stack up more chlorophyll in their leaves that thereby become darker and less vibrant. Have a look for shaded plants in your garden if you want to check this colour difference. The word Berm is Dutch for verge and is used as such here in the Netherlands, but here those strips are owned by the local government and maintained by their contractors over here. Cheers, Wilbert
I spent a fair amount of my childhood in Chicagoland and Kansas City, and all the people I met called the land between the sidewalk and the street a parkway. I'm shocked you didn't mention parkway in your video being a Chicagolander yourself now.
I grew up and live in Alabama. I never even thought about what to call that extra portion of grass between the sidewalk and the street. Interesting episode. Thanks!
BTW Neutral Ground is not the whole Gulf Coast...but only New Orleans metro. They use that for any city owned strip...such as where the streetcars run on St Charles. In Mobile the part in front of your sidewalk is the easement. The part in the middle in the median.
Most Americans i believe never think about it, because it is not a matter of enough importance for Americans to name it, or even think of giving it a proper name.
"Yard" is the maintained area of land around your home ( If you have very large property, you can have a yard, and then things are in wild/natural state outside of that). A yard can contain both a garden and a lawn. The garden is the portion of the yard containing everything but the grass. You can have an herb garden, a flower garden (although these can also be called flower beds also - totally confusing, I know!), a vegetable garden...and so forth. The lawn is the portion of the yard with grass, which is maintained through mowing. In theory, you could have a yard that contains neither grass nor a garden; it could be just dirt or rocks (go to Arizona to see some of these).
Or here in PA we have a few ( more than 2, less than a hundred)acres, that’s not ever farmed we call it - property . And we call the back part no one can see- the back 40!
Exactly, I have 5 acres of densely wooded property, with my backyard abutting an official civil war battlefield. My own land was part of the battle but was zoned for agriculture. I have a garden directly behind my house but have chosen to leave the bulk natural. My garden is absolutely distinct from my yard or lane.
In Omaha, the "yard" can be frontyard or backyard. Legally the front yard may not contain flowers, fruits or vegetables. The city desires all front yards to be grass. Although, there is no "requirement" for this. Just negative reinforcement for not having grass. Some houses place rocks (like in Phoenix Arizona), some pave it over with concrete, blacktop, bricks, etc. These home ate generally hit with additional taxes and fees for maintaining an additional "parking area" other than the driveway. In addition, places where houses once stood but are now empty of house and foundation are considered "empty lots". If owners try to do anything except plant and maintain grass, they are cited and fined. Community gardens or even just using your empty lot as flower or vegetable garden is an offense. Even though there's no front yard or back yard...the whole lot is considered "front yard". So it is more correct to say most places use the legal names for parts of a residential lot because of the plethora of legal citations involving said lots or parts of. Oh, BTW...Business owners can legally fence an existing sidewalk and right of way and make it part of their lot. Although this usually pertains to areas adjacent to the businesses parking lots. Why is this allowed? Because the city can now tax that space as parking spaces.
Footpaths! You must live in fancy Australia. In non-fancy Australia, we just have really big nature strips with lots of hidden divots from the postman's motorbike.
I just watched a video explaining nature strips in Australia. I might have missed the part about the footpath, or it didn't stick out to different enough from sidewalk for me to notice it being mentioned. I think it was an American noting the term, nature strip though.
XD You've just enlightened me. I read a series of books by an Aussie author where the characters were always walking along footpaths and I was honestly envisioning like a dirt trail, because that's what a footpath would usually mean in America. It all makes so much more sense now. XD
Here in Forest Hills, Queens, NY there’s sidewalks with and without the grass on the street side of the sidewalk and it seems to vary from block to block, like one block got together and decided “we don’t want this” and ripped it out and paved it, while the next block was like, “that block is nuts” and kept theirs.
Thanks Laurence I don’t think you could ever know how many of us Americans didn’t know what that strip of grass was called until now!!! I know I didn’t🤷🏽♀️
Ahh….the sounds of home. I’m from Missouri and the sound of the locusts made me feel like I was back there for a minute! Also, in my suburban neighborhood, most people didn’t have fences and we kids fairly freely through the backyards of our various neighbors. Happy times. 🙂
Virtually no one had a fence in my neighborhood growing up between 1962 and1980. I've revisited and still there seemed to be very few fences. Most separation between houses is accomplished by the driveway alongside each house.
Another interesting and humorous comparison, Laurence. It was great to see Arthur again! He's very telegenic; you should feature him a little more in your videos.
I totally agree, puppies are so bouncy, happy & photogenic. And Arthur has a wiggle when he walks. Oh, and that tongue out makes him look like hes saying "daddy were going for a walk? Yay!!!"
I want you to know what these videos are interesting even for non-British/non-American audiences. I, an Indonesian who barely have access to sidewalks, didn’t know that there’s so many names for the devil’s strip (this is now my favorite term). As a bonus, now I kind of understand the meaning of the word ‘terrace’ whenever my Malaysian friends talk about their housings. Cheers to that! 🍻
There is definitely a difference between green in the UK and the US. I'm so glad to hear someone else say it! Spring comes earlier in most of the US so the leaves have more time to become deep green. The UK greenery feels like perennial springtime green...until the leaves fall to the ground.
I know I'm late to the party, but I'm catching up on lots of past videos. I've lived in many states east of the Rocky Mountains and I think that in most of them the grassy area either doesn't exist or it's called an easement. Here, a few miles west of you in Aurora, IL, it's called a parkway and it is administered by the city. Parkways, which may or may not include a sidewalk, encroach on our yards anywhere from about 5 ft to upwards of 25 ft, depending on the size of the yard. The good news is that the city takes care of the trees that are planted in the parkway. They do not, however, mow, fertilize, water, etc. Welcome to the hodgepodge that is Chicagoland!
Brit here 🇬🇧. Currently sat in my garden, intensely assessing the grenliness of the trees in my periphery. I can concur that the shade of green is a rich but ultimately dark shade of green. I am visiting the USA next week so I will hopefully remember to return here to report my findings in the land of the Chick fil A.
@@KJones-qs7ju my life changed forever when I tried chick fil A sauce. Now I travel annually to America to enjoy this delicacy. In the past I’ve visited on a Sunday and then found myself very upset.
Chick Fil a sandwiches are shockingly good. Get the battered, deep fried varient. That is where they shine. Back when every fast food place was trying to copy chick fil a, a friend of mine asked his manager (they worked at chick fil a) if he was worried about McDonald's stealing their business. He asked as they stood in the kitchen at 5 am hand battering all the chicken for the day The boss said he'd worry when McDonalds started hand battering all their chicken on the morning before it was served. If you like deep fried chicken and sweet iced tea, it's hard to beat.
@@KJones-qs7ju I have never heard of it. Then again, I never hear of 5 guys until I was in the US and my friend (from the UK) and I went to one and he told me there were plenty in the UK.
Here in Minnesota, the area between the curb and the sidewalk is the berm. Though, in the new areas they no longer put in sidewalks or put the sidewalk right up against the curb.
In my suburban childhood, we called your "verge" a tree lawn, because all along the street trees had been planted in the tree lawns! Looking up into that maple tree made me nostalgic. Where I live now, we mostly have pines, spruces and aspen, but I miss those broad-leaf trees.
In Texas it's commonly called an "easement strip" or simple an "easement". You're responsible for mowing it and keeping the tree trimmed higher than 14 feet above the street, but the city can do anything they want with it, such as put up a communal letter box, remove the tree or certain branches. This is also where the water meter is located.
I’m from Southern California and my instinct was to call it the easement though we didn’t have them there. (Grass is for The Wealthy and selfish jerks who are water wasters)
@@rustyroseranch Yes, basically correct. An easement is any property that YOU are expected to maintain, but the city/county/state/fed can "use". Think of a telephone pole that is mounted within your property lines, there is an easement for workers to travel to it, maintain it, replace or remove it, but you are the one maintaining the area.
Verges? My parents called our grass strip a "betterment". (Massachusetts) It was harder to grow nicer grass on it because of the heat of the street asphalt would bake the soil in the summer and weed seeds would blow across the pavement and get lodged and germinate right on its edge.
In Oregon, the pipe that runs from the gutter to the ground is called the drainage pipe. A median refers to the divider in the middle of the freeway. Never heard or thought about a real name for the grass between the sidewalk and the curb. Very interesting. Thanks for sharing!
Yeah, same. Oregon raised, and when he said that PacNW called that bit of grass a median, I thought, no? A median is the strip of concrete separating the traffic directions.
Washington (state) checking in, also have no name for grassy strip. Median definitely refers to the thing in the middle of the road. Also I would have guessed downspout was British, I've only ever heard drainpipe or drainage pipe.
I was born and raised in Oregon but now live in Florida but we grew up calling it the side median or easement. Either one used and I would know what someone meant
I live in Oregon and never heard a name for it. A neighbor told me I'm supposed to take care of it though. Does it belong to the city or part of my property?
Less cloud cover in the US also means the sun can shine through the leaves, making it appear that much greener. Btw, i did grow up in a suburb, and ours had no grassy strip as its a 40+ year old neighborhood with no sidewalks. Or curbs even. But it is very green with many mature trees. Which i absolutely love!!
In Oak Park Illinois, where I live, (close to where YOU live Laurence) we call it a "Parkway". And strangely, i have never heard it called anything else in my 62 years. "Live and learn" "Die and forget everything" as my Grandma used to say.
I am Canadian. I call it "that annoying thing no one owns but is forced to care for". Fortunately... my town has largely removed them and replaced them with trees and cobblestones so essentially, it just makes the sidewalk wider, they obviously mulch around the tree a little bit so the tree can get water but I like the cobblestone patches... We have a lot of pesticide restrictions here so grass is often mostly a whole lot of different green weeds, so it's not as lovely close up.
@@revcrussell yeah I think most ppl in my town who have it only maintain it if they're having to walk through it and the city doesn't do it often enough. I would be quite roar if I HAD to do it but also couldn't use it for anything, like a chair or a pot of flowers etc... I like that most of ours are cobblestone though, geese would have it nasty all summer if it was grass.
I’m 59 and live in Indiana. I didn’t know it had a name. It’s just the strip of grass by the road. My parents are from England and I have more relatives in England then here. I enjoy hearing you talk about what my family from across the pond talk about. Go Uxbridge and Swindon.
While watching a TH-cam channel on the hurricane in FL a few days ago, someone called a small building a shed. Thus began a comment frenzy. It was not a shed but a pavilion; not a pavilion but a gazebo. We ended up having a vote, which was even more divisive. 😁
In a suburb of Chicago, we call the grass between the sidewalk and the curb a "parkway". Just like you, I'd never heard of many of the other names. I've learned in Australia they call them "nature strips" (or at least Tim the Lawnmower Man calls them that; good man donating free lawnmowing services to persons needing a bit of help).
Grew up in Minnesota and spent copious amounts of time in Eastern North Dakota, and while there were a few who called that grassy strip between sidewalk/pavement and the roadway a verge, most often it was called the boulevard. I still call it a boulevard. Some of these other names make me shake my head or giggle.
I have lived in neither country but visited both. I think English suburbs and nature look more ‘natural’ and beautiful to me, personally. USA suburbs have more of a strange flatpack effect, though they have some of the most beautiful natural spots in national parks etc.
To be fair England has had much much longer for their natural greenery to get old and lush again, while US had most of its forests and prairies “settled” & “tamed” just a couple hundred years ago, and then modern neighborhoods put in 😅 speed was the main goal with the population boom post war, thus baby boomers.
Also, the desire to have huge empty lawns of mostly non-native species (one of the ways European tradition was kept up by the descendants of the colonists) as a status symbol remained for the majority that now live in the suburbs. That's the reason it looks unnatural and sparse there.
A lot of that is due to how most U.S. suburbs are fairly young and were designed to house as many people as possible with the square footage modern houses tend to get. I know, that's rich when you consider how much smaller properties tend to be elsewhere, but we also have a lot more properly habitable space than most places. A lot of it also depends on terrain, as suburbs is hillier areas do tend to follow the geography for practical (meaning it's both cheaper and faster) to generally follow the terrain. There is also the fact that there is a condition on the fact that roads also play a role, and roads follow the terrain and (usually) the path of least resistance where it comes to construction. And suburbs come in all varieties because of this.
I call it the parkway strip. Also homes in the East Coast usually don't have fences between yards. In the West, homes always have fenders between their yard.
I grew up in Illinois and now live in Minnesota. I’ve never heard of it having a specific name. Just “that strip of yard next to the road” or “that bit of grass that’s annoying to mow.”
I grew up in Minnesota and lived in Illinois and we never had a special name for the grass on the other side of the sidewalk except “best get it mowed, kids,” lol! 😂
I was gonna say, lived in MN my whole life and I feel like most of the terms are used for other things, but the actual strip of grass doesn't have a concrete name
I grew up in the south suburbs and my dad called it an easement because in our suburb the city owns it. There was one behind the house for an alley which never went in. The one in the front yard between the sidewalk and the street was huge! Long after we moved out, a center turn lane was built into route 83 and the easement is not as huge anymore.
I've lived in New Jersey my entire life and I've never heard the term "grass bay". In South Jersey (near Philadelphia) we call it a "tree lawn". Lawrence, you always bring a smile to my face please keep it up!
As a fellow Illinoisan, I can’t believe you left out “parkway” which is what everyone I know calls it. 😮 Maybe that memo got lost in the pond - or Great Lake. 😁
The “greenliness” of American trees also is different in the fall. Apparently the amazing red colors of fall leaves is distinctly an American/east Asian thing as basically every other tree just goes yellow when they lose their leaves for the winter.
I have been to America in the Autumn, and I was just a little disappointed with the colours. Yes, not so many of our trees in the UK turn red, but some do. On returning home from our holiday I thought our trees put on an equally beautiful display. I believe the weather can influence the colour of the leaves which need a cold dry spell to look their best, sometimes we just get damp mild weather which spoils the show!
@@marypiper8161 The species of tree also figures large into the color its leaves turn. In the Northeast US, particularly, we tend to have a lot of maple trees, which usually turn brilliant scarlet in the Fall, same as the Japanese versions. Warm, dry weather preceding the leaf turnings also encourages predominance of anthocyanins in leaves of trees that produce them at all.
According to my brother, a tree surgeon, the vibrancy of the autumn/fall colours is as a result of the weather and how rapid the transition from summer to autumn climate is. It's something to do with the amount of sunshine the leaves are absorbing Vs how rapidly they stop photosynthesis and the resulting build up of sugars retained in the leaves. So in the US, especially further inland, the seasonal transition tends to be both rapid and consistent, so there are more residual sugars left in the leaves (I think) resulting in more vibrancy. Basically, long hot summers with lots of sunshine and a quick transition to fall equals a more colourful display. Whereas in the UK, being an island and therefore subject to much less consistent weather patterns (lots more contributing factors) the seasonal transition *can* be more incremental and the trees are subject to less sunshine in the summer months. So they usually manage to process more of the sugars before the leaves are shed, hence the colour of the autumn leaves tend to be more subdued, but every now and again we might get a good spell of sunshine in late summer that results in a nicer autumn display. There are other factors, like air pollution, that can also have an impact; I dare say that the air quality is far superior in American suburbs than in Central London, for example. And as someone else pointed out, the Hue of the leaves (as opposed to the vibrancy) is dependent on the species of tree. Apologies for the rather long-winded explanation, which is coming second hand from someone who knows what they are talking about via someone who doesn't, but I hope that makes sense. It did when it was explained to me 😂
I left your channel for a while and came back and I think your content has really gone to the next level while I was away! I appreciate all the research you are doing. Very interesting.
In the San Francisco Bay Area we call it a parking strip. I suspect the vibrancy of the greenery in America depends on where one lives. Chicago gets rain in the summer, so things tend to stay green. Where I live, we get very little rain for six months out of the year, so things tend to not be as green a lot of the time.
I want to thank you for not being so Anti-American. I get that people will think and say whatever they want, but it is remarkably refreshing to find a person who isn't originally from America who doesn't insult us that much or in your case at all. And I know there has to be other folks like you, you're one of the few I have personally encountered. I honestly wish that I could financially support you, but instead I can just say keep being you!
@@sweiland75 Wasn't making a statement against that. Was just saying thank you for being kind. Have been marking some channels as do not show me this crap for a couple of days.... so, I found all his videos refreshing and said as much.
I live in Massachusetts, raised in New York. Most often, I call a verge “a verge,” except when there isn’t actually a sidewalk present, then it’s called “an easement.” The town technically owns the easements, and they have a right to do things like lay water mains or utility lines underneath them, or build sidewalks upon them (thus creating a verge). You still have to maintain and mow the portion that abuts your property, though. You mentioned a “Common,” and that is a uniquely New England thing, but it’s not a verge. In many New England towns, a “Common” was common land owned by the town and used for pasturage, meetings, commerce, and even as a burial ground. In my town, the Common is the parcel of green space associated with a large Unitarian Universalist church in the center of town. It’s jointly maintained by the church and the town, and it’s used for things like fairs, festivals, incredibly polite protests, official Christmas-tree lightings, and, with the addition of portable fencing, a Biergarten. Since it’s bordered on one edge by a public sidewalk, the Town Common ironically has its very own verge.
@ lachimiste1 .......And shovel the sidewalk during the winter months - requirement since it is considered common land. Yes! The village greens in NE and the old villages upstate NY are very nice. Some even have an elevated, roofed pavilion called a bandstand. Very nice ..... So long as the people in the community respect the common space (i.e. don't litter, clean up after their dogs, respect the older folks sitting on the benches, and walking along the sidewalks within the park etc.) A playground is usually nearby for the children to romp. Originally these places were where churches were built (and used as graveyards by the original settlers)[1], as well as the first school for the village being on one side of green. ________________________________________ 1.) In the 1800's the rural cemetery movement encouraged these churches to have their members buried in the new cemetery in the nearby the village. Some churches (most) opted to have their buried members removed and re-interred in the new cemetery
This is weird because I grew up in a UK suburb with front lawns, verges and lots of trees, which I took very much for granted. Then I got to an age where having friends who didn't live anywhere nearby started happening. One visiting friend remarked "it's so GREEN (here)" and I was not even remotely able to respond to that.
@@bradleyheck7204 Not that I know of. In fact there were (and still are) similarly named streets nearby with no verges, and a lot of nearby industry, but unless you wandered into the heart of that, you were almost always within sight of a couple of trees or a lawn, if not both.
I live in Northern California, and am an Anglophile, have visited the UK many times.. while English villages are very beautiful and charming. I think American suburbs are much more tractive than UK suburbs for some of the reasons you mentioned.. they have large lawns in front of them, and they have verges which gives you protection from traffic. But there are regional differences. I remember visiting the Midwest several years ago, and noticing that they tend not to have fences between their houses - everything is open I think that’s because Midwesterners are very trusting of their neighbors, and very open to their neighbors. Nor do they have backyard fences . All ready to go in California everybody has a fence or a wall around their property. Or at least a hedge between their house and their neighbors.
Midwesterner here. I mean, the fence isn't necessary unless you have a dog. You'd have to be insane to just wander into someone's yard, and anything of value is either in the house or in a (generally locked) shed or garage. (Really anything you don't want destroyed over the winter or knocked over by deer goes in the shed) Unless you're just worried about your neighbors stepping on your plants or something. But why would they do that? Plus a fence means no one can park on the lawn when there's a big get-together. It's much more common to fence your backyard for privacy and to let your dogs run in it, but by no means is it necessary. Front yard is mostly for show, or to stand on and look at your neighbor's yards from. Most stuff happens in the backyard. I don't understand why no fences is a sign of trust though. Anyone insane enough to walk on random people's lawns could just open the gate. Unless you guys put locks on your fences???
Also if you like your neighbors you might even add an empty spot or gate to a fence so you can hang out easier. Otherwise just lean against the fence and talk.
I'm from Syracuse NY, which I figure is the Gateway to the Midwest, culturally and linguistically. Right in the city there's a mix of fenced and unfenced properties, but out in the suburbs it's uncommon to fence the yards.
One of the big differences is that there is much more space in the US for people and housing. In Britain, England in particular, space is at a premium. We must be the most densely populated country on Earth. If ever the American proverb "good fences make good neighbours" applies anywhere it is England.
I'm 76 and have lived in Connecticut all my life; I only recently found out "that bit of grass" was called a verge. Also, it's not Just suburbs that have this. I grew up in Hartford which is the capitol of Connecticut and all streets have this bit of grass and usually small/tiny front lawns. I was terribly shocked the first time I was in a "real" city and people's front rooms were literally on the sidewalk.
This is super interesting to me. I grew up in WI learning that a berm is a small hill or raised strip built on the property, behind the sidewalk in the yard, to dampen road noise or serve as a sort of fence.
Berm is used for the grassy side of the road. Mostly there is no sidewalk for pedestrians in that case. I realize that in the Netherlands sidewalks are mostly directly adjacent to the road. So there is a berm or there is a sidewalk (trottoir or stoep)
In my part of Canada, verges are called boulevards. Which is nice in a way: we have a word for these areas. The frustrating thing is that there are also boulevards, which are streets with a median in the... median. The median of a boulevard (street) can be grass or concrete or whatever. You really have to watch context with 'boulevard' because of this.
An interesting video. I just call it the strip of lawn between the sidewalk and street. I never thought about how the frequent cloudiness in the UK would affect the greenliness of the plants and trees, though it makes perfect sense. Your puppy dog, Arthur, isd so cute and adorable!
I'm American but have spent a huge amount of time in England over decades, and you're absolutely right - the green in the US is more vibrant. Very observant! (I'm NJ born and bred - never heard of "grass bay").
The long straight border between US and Canada is the 49th parallel. This parallel also passes by Jersey, the Channel Island off the French coast - this every bit of Great Britain is considerably further north than the entire contiguous 48 states ( as well as Hawaii, of course). While it is warmed by the Gulf Stream, Great Britain does not get nearly the strength of sunshine that the US does. It will get longer days in the summer, but the rays are still at such a much lower angle, that they do not as effectively fuel photosynthesis.
I think another thing about the US is that the sky is bluer, especially in the south, like Texas. I believe it has to do with proximity to the equator.
In the city of Seattle, Washington State, this area is called a planting strip. I've also heard it called a parking strip. A median is the area between 2 directions of a freeway. A swale is a planting strip that has been dug out to provide a rain garden for water running off of the street.
Australia has multiple names for the grass strip as well. I have heard it called the verge, nature strip, council strip, council stripe council easement and grass strip.
I'm an Englishman living in Australia. Much of what you observe in the US also applies to Aus. In Melbourne we call the verge a 'nature strip'. Love your work😁
Australians & New Zealanders do tend to pickup up most naming variants from the UK & USA on top of any local variants, you could use any of the common terms interchangeably and most people would understand you perfectly well. (it can be quite common to use multiple names for the same thing in a single statement), where as compared to a large number of my colleagues from America who would get stumped on certain terms/names that were not from their region when they first arrived. Berm/Verge/Nature Strip/Council Strip, Sidewalk/footpath, Trash Can/Rubbish Bin/Garbage Can/Dumpster, Boot/Trunk, Bonnet/Hood, Restroom/Toilet/Bathroom/Dunny/Shitter etc
The legal term for that strip is called a planting strip. This refers to the green space between the sidewalk and the road. I wondered as well, so I looked it up in the property law dictionary. Yes there IS such a thing. There are actually laws and regulations about how wide it should be and where it can and can’t be. Normally the sidewalk is the edge of the right of way minus one inch. Thus the sidewalk and planting strip are both in the right of way. Some localities specify a different margin, half an inch, sometimes 3 inches.
I grew up in areas that didn't have sidewalks at all, so we had no name for that grass strip. As an adult I moved to an urban area with no lawns, where the fronts of the houses are next to the sidewalk. I've since moved to suburbs where the most common pattern is that commercial/apartment building zones have sidewalk extending from building to road and single-family homes have small front yards but no sidewalk. All of these locations were in different regions of the US. I've seen the grass strips, but never lived around them somehow. I didn't know there was even any specific term for them until recently.
In Denver, we called the tree lawn, the historic use of it was to plant trees. Like much of the Midwest trees do not naturally occur. We are high plains, so every tree has to be planted in. This was a way of providing a space for trees to help shade the sidewalk and to create a more beautiful Urbanspace. It’s interesting to see pictures taken around the 1900s of Denver and you’ll see small one to 2 inch caliper trees everywhere. Now those trees are fully mature and provide a beautiful canopy for the city.
Nice to know that in the UK, the verge is actually the responsibility of the local council. I do remove litter, but at least I don't have to mow it. 😁 Where I am there are more wild flowers in the local verges, due to my London suburb, being built on old farmland, so there are also mostly healthy trees, new and old, of various varieties, along with plentiful wildlife, birds of many species, mammals, like foxes, rat and mice, local domestic and feral cats, local dogs and all the insects, bumblebee, honey bees, moths and butterflies, loads of worms, etc.
That strip between the sidewalk and the street is part of the city’s ROW (right of way). It allows the city to widen roads if needed because of population growth or rezoning in the area. The part between the sidewalk and your house is your front yard, lawn, garden, etc. Typically flowers are planted in the front yard while gardens (vegetables, herbs, and fruits) are planted in the backyard.
I've lived my whole life in the northwest suburbs of Chicago and have only known that strip of grass as a "Parkway". Love all your videos, and your new word - grenliness!! 😊❤
You know what? This video is literally the first time in my life I've ever heard anyone mention the grass between the sidewalk and the road, so I can't say what they would have called it if they had. Now that I'm thinking about it, it's honestly weird that I haven't heard anyone talk about such a ubiquitous thing, yet here we are.
In Northeast Ohio, we typically call the strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street a "tree lawn". I am no authority on this matter but I assume it is because we primarily plant trees in that strip and in some municipalities, the street department is responsible for maintenance of those trees because of their proximity to overhead power/telecom lines. The "devil strip" thing is mostly limited to Akron, OH and suburbs (I live in that area).
I'm from NE Ohio and would agree up until ten years ago. The devil strip inspired a mini-business boom of that same name a few years back and the name caught on, even more. Now I hear it a lot of places in the region. Hello my fellow Buckeyes ❤
So strange. I spent two summers studying at Oxford in the UK, and visited the English and Welsh countryside. I thought the green of the sheep pastures was far more vibrant than anything in America, and I grew up in Kentucky (known for it's "bluegrass", which is actually just disappointingly green). The grass is always greener on the other side of the pond, I guess! Here in northeast Florida, we call that grassy strip on the other side of the sidewalk an "easement".
Yes, I've always found Britain to be much greener than the rest of Europe and the places I've visited in the States (hotter parts, admittedly). I always assumed it was down to our annual precipitation which is pretty evenly distributed throughout the year.
Correct it is an easement. I lived in Ky it is a beautiful state. My great great grandfather got a scholarship to Oxford university. He went to Worcester college and became a vicar. His brother went to Lincoln and became a surgeon. They grew up in Oxford and their uncle ( mom’s brother ) was the mayor of Oxford. Probably why I had a dictionary at age 6 and I had to look up words that I didn’t understand when reading a book.
Funnily enough I saw a video that explained that’s why cars ‘park’ and an area for leaving your car is called a ‘car park’ because when car ownership took off they were cluttering up the high streets so they removed the parkways and paved them as a zone to leave your car hence park way became a car park. I’m from the UK and we, as he said call them verges, but we still inherited the American terminology of parking and car parks.
I live in Southern California. We called the strip of grass nearest the street a parkway. I had no idea there were so many names for this plot of land. Glad you brought up the location of street signs. That is one of the first things I noticed when I first visited England. 😊
Wow. I didn't know other Americans called the grass between the yard and the street as "verges" etc.. In the Utah (in places where there are actually sidewalks) we call them "park strips."
Growing up in northern California, we referred to the "verge", or however it's spelled, as the parking strip. Also, I picked up on Laurence's pronunciation of dictionary that sounds decidedly more American.
I intentionally didn't discuss housing differences, because I did so previously in this video: th-cam.com/video/Myx-jrf9K_E/w-d-xo.html
I LEARNED so much about that grassy area in tis vid. LOL
You are one of the few TH-camrs that, when I read one of your comments, I can't help but hear your voice as I do so.
Lawrence, it's funny because to hear most Europeans talk, there is no such thing as a suburb outside of North America. Of course we all know that's not correct. 🙂 I have no idea what we call that thing between the sidewalk and the pavement here in the SF Bay Area....I can't think of anyone referring specifically to that. But I'll go with "mow strip" since apparently you saw it somewhere, lol 🙂
Laurence, I don't have that "grassy area" where I live, just a huge front "lawn" (garden). But ive heard people call it "the city strip" cause the city that I live in is in charge of keeping it clean and mowed. I guess it just depends on where you live. Ive had to call my city's Maint. dept and tell them that the main road I live off of needed to have the trash picked up & mowed & also when a dead tree was abt to fall in the street.
Btw, it was nice to see Arthur again, hes such a happy bouncy puppy. The reason ppl want to speak to other ppl that have puppies is cause we know they must have a good heart if they love puppies/dogs. Make sense? We know that we have one thing in common and that's our love of dogs. Have you ever heard about the guys who get dog walking jobs so they can meet girls, cause girls see them as sensitive and caring. ❤
Neutral Ground isn't the bit of grass between sidewalk and street - in Louisiana, it's the grass in the middle of a street that has that kind of divisor in the middle. In eastern PA, it's "median".
32 yrs in southeastern PA (Philly suburbs) , never called that grass strip a "berm" - it was a curb strip. In Texas now for 25 yrs, and I haven't had to bother naming it because it doesn't exist in 3/4s of the suburbs. It's just yard, then street. Boom. No sidewalks. Safety? Pfft! (I mean, look at TX gun laws SIGH). But berms are slopes next to highways.
I live in western Pennsylvania and I always call the strip of grass between the street and the sidewalk ... "the strip of grass between the street and the sidewalk".
Ditto here in CA. I referred to it as front lawn sometimes.
Same in South Carolina.
My Father is from Titusville Pa and he called it
“The Devil Strip”
By no means makes it official but that is what he said.
I call it the yard, there just happens to be a sidewalk going through it :)
Here in Oregon most people say “planting strip” or “median.” Some people call it a “right of way” if there is no sidewalk
In the USA, the word "garden" typically refers specifically to a plot planted with vegetables. (*or flowers*) So we might have both a "yard" and a "garden".
Not just vegetables, flowers too.
@@ferretyluvflowers and ornamental plants is the first thing that comes to my mind as an American hearing "garden", more so than vegetables. Not everyone grows food at their house but most people have at least some strip of dirt where they grow plants that they like and pull "weeds" that they don't like.
I have a flower garden and veggie garden
Yeah, Midwestern USA a garden is any part of a residential property for either food (mostly vegetables) or ornamental plants are grown.
I recall being thrown off by some British novels I read as a kid. They'd have descriptions of playing in the garden, which knowing gardens as non playing areas made no sense until I learned the British definition.
One typically keeps their garden in their back yard.
my parents in iowa called it "city easement" or just "easement" because of how much control the city has for that space between sidewalk and street. the mantra was "the city owns that spot but you have to take care of it."
Yes, "city strip". Lawrence forgot the most essential attribute, though, that anything you leave on it is considered 'up for grabs'.
Diana, my family have always called it an easement too.
Easement! From Wisconsin, lived in Kansas. Same in both places.
Yes, in Iowa it I call it an Easement. When I lived in Denver, I used the same word and nobody ever questioned it, or made fun of me. 😅 I've also heard right-of-way used.
Thats what I heard it called in Kansas as well
I’ve always called it an easement, because while the homeowner owns it and is responsible for it, the city holds an easement from the curb to the house side of the sidewalk. This prevents a homeowner from making a legal claim to deny access to the sidewalk to pedestrians.
Yes, I call it the easement
I thought the homeowner had an easement, meaning they were allowed to use it to access their property even though it is city property…sometimes also used for driveways that are shared between multiple homes.
My grandma also called it an easement. (north central WI) I thought the city did own that strip of land but homeowners were responsible for taking care of it? Whatever way it works it's confusing.
@@TimothyReeves in most cities, the property owner owns the land. The tax records will define it in any case. Shared driveways can also constitute an easement, but that’s a minefield I would never enter by buying a house with a shared driveway. Also when you have buried utilities (phone, power, cable, etc) in either the front or back yard, the utility companies maintain an easement to access their facilities.
I thought an easement was any common ground between homes or on the edges of the community.
Haha! I’m a traffic engineer that used to work in the UK. When writing my first report I used “verge” and my boss asked what that meant. I had to replace it with “grassy strip next to the road”. 😅Swales are usually verges that collect rainwater, and berms are a verge that is mounded up.
So interesting to hear the correct info and your insight on this! It never fails to amaze me how something as innocuous as the name for a strip of land can be so varied from one place to another lol. Thank you for commenting 😀
Living roughly in the center of the US, I agree with your definitions. Except for "verge" - we side with your boss on that one.
A swale is a type of drainage area or piece of land that has a dip in it. A berm is a built up area higher than the land around it usually used to protect from flooding or other items.
Swales can be a road that dips down and comes back up
As a law enforcement traffic homicide investigator for a couple of decades, the difference depended on how the strip of grass was separated from the road surface. If there was a curb, it was a parkway…if not, a swale. I think this is found in the USDOT Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices…or maybe somewhere else. It’s been too long, but some things just stick with you.
I call it "the other side of the sidewalk" ... and this year my city planted more than a hundred trees in my neighborhood in that zone and I got a 10 foot tall oak. I'm so happy about it that I had to share.
I'm happy you're happy 😊, you can never have enough oaks! Enjoy it!
You don't have to take GOOD care of the tree they forced upon you. And WHO has to repair the damage the tree makes as it overgrows that too-slim space? Certainly not the city, I bet. It's a form of taxation without representation -- or consultation or consideration.
The Werefrog got the electric company to remove the trees in that area for free. Yelled at them for not sending the insurance proof of their tree remover people: the one condition to allow them on the lawn. They offered to remove entirely, and The Werefrog took them up on it. Then yelled at them for remaining mess. They came out and cleaned it up.
@@jerelull9629 You are correct. If the city planted it and those roots grow into the pipes, it's the homeowner's responsibility to get it fixed.
@@jerelull9629it’s not taxation without representation - you can literally email your representation in local, state, and even federal, to voice your disagreement. Unless it was put in after you moved to the house without your consent it is just another expense of owning that house. If you don’t like it, don’t buy a house that has it.
You named 15 or so names for something I never knew had a name. I’d go with “that grassy thing over there”
Grassy knoll. lol
I didn't know they had names, either. In Louisiana and Texas, I've always considered it part of the front yard. Some houses, streets, and neighborhoods don't even have sidewalks.
I'm going with "sidewalk taint" from now on.
I'm from Chicago suburbs! We don't talk about those grassy things, we just mow them and don't ask questions.
Man...I've lived in suburbs most of my life (excluding 12 years in New York City), and I utterly and completely had no idea that strip of grass next to the sidewalk even HAD a name...let alone dozens! I learn something every day, and often from Lawrence!
🤣🤣🤣
I grew up in Southern Connecticut which is the NY tri-state area, and New England at the same time, and I've never heard most of these terms... if I had to name it I'd have said 'median.'
@@masterofallgoons but “median” is that bit of sidewalk in the middle of a road. Being from MA, never once have I heard a name for that strip of grass next to the sidewalk. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone refer to is separately from just the yard.
@@Diphenhydra - yeah 'median' or 'island' is usually what I'd say or hear for that, but like I said, if I had to name that bit of grass I'd probly have said 'median' .. but I've never heard it named before... but I was surprised to hear him say 'median' was a pacific northwest thing
I lived in Los Angeles most of my life with some in Montreal and I too have never realized that this even had a name. It's just basically there.
I live in Louisville, KY and have always called the area between the sidewalk and the road/street the easement. The area in the middle of the road - dividing the two sides of the road is what we call the median.
Hello from just across the river! I live just near Corydon.
The median here usually has flowers and bushes too. They are maintained by the city. The city I used to live in had 2 with waterfalls that we referred to as free car washes.
I have heard it referred to as the easement by builders and land surveyors.
It is also common to call it a median in Cleveland, Ohio too. Easement was the only other term I recognised for tree lawn. I literally had to wait through most of the bit to understand what he was referring to because I was unfamiliar with any of the other 15 terms. I had no idea America was so divided! 😂
Here in Tennessee, we also call it an easement!
I am from Cleveland, OH and we call that strip of grass a Tree Lawn. That is where the city plants the city trees. The city owns the street, the Tree Lawn, the tree, and the sidewalk, however, it is the homeowner's responsibility to mow the Tree Lawn and shovel the sidewalk.
Right?! I'm a Clevelander, too.😊
Another Clevelander, another tree lawn.
We Southerners would say shovel the snow from the sidewalk if it ever happened. That would probably be once every other leap year. Come to think of it, even when it snows here it melts the next day by 10:00 am.
In Akron, we call it a Devil’s Strip.
Cleveland Heights OH checking in. We always called it tree lawn too. Some of my Akron coworker friends called it devils strip
It's hard to compare British suburbs to American suburbs, because there are huge regional differences. Regarding how green everything is, keep in mind that much of the US is at the latitude of Portugal and Spain. I've noticed that the color of the sky and trees is more intense, due to the sun being more direct.
Having come back to Ireland recently from a two week holiday in Spain I have to agree about the colours in Spain being more intense.
We lived in Ann Arbor for over 20 years, and I never once heard the term extension lawn. We always called it an easement and yes, our current easement does contain a large tree.
Same!
Not Ann Arbor, but still in Michigan. We also call it an easement.
Central IL we call it that as well.
We do as well in Iowa
To me it is the place where the snow from the road gets piled up. In really snowy places it becomes a wall separating the sidewalk canyon from the road.
I call the strip of grass between the sidewalk and curb "city property that I am expected to take care of." Thanks Lawrence. Peace!!
City bureaucrats can kiss my grits 😅
We've always called it an easement. A lot of rural neighborhoods don't have sidewalks, but there is almost always an easement where permanent structures can't be built that the city/county can use for utilities at their will. I've never thought to call it anything else as it was at least descriptive for it's practical use.
Here in western Canada, we call the verge a boulevard. A major reason for them, is for the depositing of snow in the winter. The boulevards get snow piled on them by the snow plows. This keeps both the roads and the sidewalks useable without having to truck the snow away. Same reason for the street signs being up higher. Signs mounted on a low wall would be obscured by corner snow piles. It’s all very practical.
We call it a boulevard as well here in Ontario.
In eastern South Dakota too
I'm going to just say it. Calling it a boulevard seems very odd. I grew up living along a boulevard, but it was a kind of street. This is particularly odd because even though the definition of a boulevard is a type of broad avenue planted with rows of trees, the boulevard that I grew up on had very few trees and did not have a strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street.
My experience here in Canada is that roads are built in the center of a 66 foot right of way which is public land (66 feet was the length of 1 surveyors chain ) now days electric, TV cable and internet wires or old land line phone wires are buried under the boulevard ,the pavement usually is 25 to 30 feet of the 66 foot right of way
A boulevard is a 4 lane street with a median.
I have never called the strip between the sidewalk and the road anything other than "the other side of the sidewalk" while being vaguely annoyed I have to mow it even though I don't technically own it. I'm from Pennsylvania, and I always thought 'berm' was specifically an inclined patch of grass near a ditch that came next to a road. So thanks for teaching me something new today!
Yikes! Where I grew up the median was what separated the two traffic lanes on the right side from the two traffic lanes on the left side. Flowers and bushes were often planted in the median (or median strip). It made for a lovely drive on the boulevard.
At least, that's what I thought they were talking about...
In my part of N. America, a berm is a raised bank bordering a watercourse. And a swale is a shallow linear drainage channel with gently sloping sides. May be only seasonally filled with water.
I used to work in urban topographical mapping for civil infrastructure development when young.
Here in the PNW most people seem to call it the "parking strip."
this is also what i knew a median to be, growing up in baltimore city, maryland. @@grovermartin6874
I'm from VA and NC, and agree with the OP.
And yes. The "median" separates lanes of traffic going in opposite directions. Median = middle.
And I agree with Michael Dowson on berm. But isn't a berm on a golf course too? I don't play golf and only watch it when I'm visiting my dad and he's watching it.
As a lifelong Pacific Northwesterner, I didn't know the lawn on the other side of the sidewalk had a name. I always just called it "the lawn on the other side of the sidewalk."
Then again, I've only once briefly lived in a place that had them. Mostly I've lived in rural areas where there's no sidewalks and just a drainage ditch between lawn and road, or fields or woods instead of lawns.
I’m in the south and agree with you.
Native PNW here as well, and in 60 years I never lived anywhere that had one. Now we live in Kansas, and don’t have one here either, although there IS one on the other side of the street. I’ve never called it anything because I’ve never had a need to name it. 🤷🏻♀️
As for “median,” that’s the bit between lanes in the middle of the street or freeway.
Huh, I call it a boulevard. I'm in North Dakota, but haven't always been. I just don't think I had any need to name that until I moved here. I'd never had one before. I'm fascinated.
California here and I never knew it had a name either
PNW and we always called it the parking strip.
In the area of Lansing, Michigan, we also call it a “right of way,” because it typically comes up when discussing access by local municipalities.
Same area as you but I call it an easement
@@sabatoa These are the two I'm most familiar with. I've heard verge, but I don't recall what state I was in. I'd no idea there were so many names for it!
Same in Ontario Canada.
Here in SW MI, I think the official name is "right of way," but "curb lawn" also sounds familiar to me. (I've never had one myself.)
The strip of grass in the center of the street is the median. Between the sidewalk and street is called an easement. You would probably find that there is utilities equipment buried there, such as water, sewer and gas lines.
Beautiful camera shots in this video Lawrence. Thank you for being the coolest British-American guy on TH-cam. 💜
I'm fascinated by all the terms you used to describe the bit of grass between the street and sidewalk. I have to confess I don't think I've ever heard it referred to as anything at all. I mean it's there and people know it's there, but I just don't remember anyone calling it anything. I'd never even considered that it had a name or ever even wondered if it did. I'd be up all night thinking about it except that it's already after 1 in the morning and I probably won't be able to stay awake much longer thinking about anything.
Exactly! I've never heard it called anything .. just that dead grass area where the dogs do their business.
Agreed. I'm from Wisconsin and have never heard anyone refer to it as anything special. 🤷♀️
Oh good. I'm not the only one. I did not hear anything familiar as he was suggesting names. I've lived in Ohio, California (LA & San Diego) and now Wisconsin.
I was born and raised in California and today was the first time that I'd ever considered the possibility that the bit of lawn on the other side of the sidewalk had its own name.
It's referred to as a parkway in Chicago. As for the tree; dig out grass in a box shape 1-2 feet around the tree. You can put in wood chips but leaving it dirt is actually easier to pull or weed wack any grass or weeds that grow. Makes mowing easier and it doesn't look as bad as you think. Looks pretty nice if you upkeep it.
I was waiting for parkway to be mentioned. I’m surprised he didn’t mention it since he lives here… I grew up in the Chicago suburbs and only heard parkway or sometimes easement.
@@cobrakai3732I feel like Easement is the legal term for the ownership of the plot. Its a parkway to me, but given that we don't own it, it functions as public land used for access. I have a river behind my house and there is a similar strip of land along it also classed as and easement that the DNR can use.
@@bobnewkirk7003 easement is if you own the property. Typically in Chicago your property line will end somewhere on the sidewalk. Then the other half of the sidewalk to the curb is the parkway. Most people will maintain it but I think legally it's only if it's a multifamily 3+ that you are required to maintain.
Also, the city just recently put in place a new plan to take care of the trees. Instead of having to call in they will work in zones and inspect/take care of them. Every three years they'll make the rounds to each tree.
I kept thinking what I remember my parents using just wasn't coming up. I couldn't remember what it was but none of those. I now clearly remember it being "parking".
Grew up in the North Shore suburbs of Chicago. It was called a parkway by one and all.
I grew up in a northern suburb of chicago- Mt Prospect, and we called the grassy area between the sidewalk and the road, a “parkway”
I’ve lived in the suburbs almost my entire life, except for my first five years when I lived across the street from a suburb in Chicago. In my Chicago suburb, we call that strip of grass a parkway, and the reason the dogs do their business on it is that generally it is part of the right of way of the street, not private property. Trees in my neighborhood are quite gren, as long as they last, because unfortunately, the trees in my neighborhood are old and huge, and storms take them out occasionally.
We also called it a parkway in Southern California where I grew up back in the 50s-60s.
We lived in the North suburbs for 20 years and called it an easment.
I was waiting for someone to say parkway! I've always called it that, and I had no idea there were so many other names.
Being a New Englander, a "common" is a town square/public green space that used to be used for "common" grazing of livestock. Now, they are used for gatherings for town events. We don't really have a name for that public grassy area between the public sidewalk and the road, although I have heard it called a verge. FYI: pavement is what we call the tar and gravel on the road it's self.
Being British by origin, I'm surprised Lawrence didn't realize this. In South Africa, we have commons as well, and I'm sure we got it from the British.
Agreed, in my part of New England we don't really have many of these. We just call it "the sidewalk grass" in the places we see it. Honestly I can't think of when I'd use the term unless I was filling out a police report or insurance affidavit.
I have lived in both New Mexico & Texas all my life, and I can tell you the greenness of trees varies in the US too. As a child when I saw photos other places, I thought they were editing the color of the trees. Turns out, no, trees elsewhere can be at least twice as green as they are in New Mexico. It has something to do with temperature and/or water.
In a lot of cases, it's an easement so that's what i call it.
@@privateinfo1711 You, sir, have replied to the wrong comment. Well done. 👏
Hi Lawrence, thanks for your nice video! I don't live in either UK nor US, but do find cultural differences and similarities interesting.
I'm a Dutch biologist, so there's two reactions I have. You are pretty close to why American leaves can be more vibrantly green. For being in more shaded circumstances most of the time UK plants need to stack up more chlorophyll in their leaves that thereby become darker and less vibrant. Have a look for shaded plants in your garden if you want to check this colour difference.
The word Berm is Dutch for verge and is used as such here in the Netherlands, but here those strips are owned by the local government and maintained by their contractors over here.
Cheers,
Wilbert
I spent a fair amount of my childhood in Chicagoland and Kansas City, and all the people I met called the land between the sidewalk and the street a parkway. I'm shocked you didn't mention parkway in your video being a Chicagolander yourself now.
Yeah. You park in a driveway and drive in a parkway, or so goes the joke.
Yes, I live in the Chicago area and also have always known it to be the parkway. And was surprised to not hear that as one of the options.
Yes, same here in Los Angeles, California.
Yep, parkway if you're from the Chicago area.
I also live in both these plkaces..but raised in Chicago. In Chicago..Elmhurst suburb..we learned tree bed. In K.C. Parkway..or tree bed.
I grew up and live in Alabama. I never even thought about what to call that extra portion of grass between the sidewalk and the street. Interesting episode. Thanks!
Same here. I just call it part of the curb.
BTW Neutral Ground is not the whole Gulf Coast...but only New Orleans metro. They use that for any city owned strip...such as where the streetcars run on St Charles.
In Mobile the part in front of your sidewalk is the easement. The part in the middle in the median.
Same! I've never thought about it until now. My house now does not have one.
@@michelehoffman1308 does it have a sidewalk?
Most Americans i believe never think about it, because it is not a matter of enough importance for Americans to name it, or even think of giving it a proper name.
"Yard" is the maintained area of land around your home ( If you have very large property, you can have a yard, and then things are in wild/natural state outside of that). A yard can contain both a garden and a lawn. The garden is the portion of the yard containing everything but the grass. You can have an herb garden, a flower garden (although these can also be called flower beds also - totally confusing, I know!), a vegetable garden...and so forth. The lawn is the portion of the yard with grass, which is maintained through mowing. In theory, you could have a yard that contains neither grass nor a garden; it could be just dirt or rocks (go to Arizona to see some of these).
Or here in PA we have a few ( more than 2, less than a hundred)acres, that’s not ever farmed we call it - property .
And we call the back part no one can see- the back 40!
Exactly, I have 5 acres of densely wooded property, with my backyard abutting an official civil war battlefield. My own land was part of the battle but was zoned for agriculture. I have a garden directly behind my house but have chosen to leave the bulk natural. My garden is absolutely distinct from my yard or lane.
In Omaha, the "yard" can be frontyard or backyard. Legally the front yard may not contain flowers, fruits or vegetables. The city desires all front yards to be grass. Although, there is no "requirement" for this. Just negative reinforcement for not having grass. Some houses place rocks (like in Phoenix Arizona), some pave it over with concrete, blacktop, bricks, etc. These home ate generally hit with additional taxes and fees for maintaining an additional "parking area" other than the driveway.
In addition, places where houses once stood but are now empty of house and foundation are considered "empty lots". If owners try to do anything except plant and maintain grass, they are cited and fined. Community gardens or even just using your empty lot as flower or vegetable garden is an offense.
Even though there's no front yard or back yard...the whole lot is considered "front yard".
So it is more correct to say most places use the legal names for parts of a residential lot because of the plethora of legal citations involving said lots or parts of.
Oh, BTW...Business owners can legally fence an existing sidewalk and right of way and make it part of their lot. Although this usually pertains to areas adjacent to the businesses parking lots. Why is this allowed? Because the city can now tax that space as parking spaces.
Good points.
Midwest US - we'll call it an easement, sidewalk strip, verge & other names. But in the heat of summer when we're mowing it's called the hellstrip.
In Australia it is sometimes called a "nature strip" And the sidewalk is a "footpath."
Footpaths! You must live in fancy Australia. In non-fancy Australia, we just have really big nature strips with lots of hidden divots from the postman's motorbike.
@@fridaytax 😆🤣😆🤣
I just watched a video explaining nature strips in Australia. I might have missed the part about the footpath, or it didn't stick out to different enough from sidewalk for me to notice it being mentioned. I think it was an American noting the term, nature strip though.
XD You've just enlightened me. I read a series of books by an Aussie author where the characters were always walking along footpaths and I was honestly envisioning like a dirt trail, because that's what a footpath would usually mean in America. It all makes so much more sense now. XD
Here in Forest Hills, Queens, NY there’s sidewalks with and without the grass on the street side of the sidewalk and it seems to vary from block to block, like one block got together and decided “we don’t want this” and ripped it out and paved it, while the next block was like, “that block is nuts” and kept theirs.
Right. I'm in Kew Gardens. We also remember having that thing where it's just one square space rather than a whole strip.
Thanks Laurence I don’t think you could ever know how many of us Americans didn’t know what that strip of grass was called until now!!! I know I didn’t🤷🏽♀️
You’re not alone 😂😂😂😂😂
Ahh….the sounds of home. I’m from Missouri and the sound of the locusts made me feel like I was back there for a minute! Also, in my suburban neighborhood, most people didn’t have fences and we kids fairly freely through the backyards of our various neighbors. Happy times. 🙂
Missouri gang
Virtually no one had a fence in my neighborhood growing up between 1962 and1980. I've revisited and still there seemed to be very few fences. Most separation between houses is accomplished by the driveway alongside each house.
Another interesting and humorous comparison, Laurence. It was great to see Arthur again! He's very telegenic; you should feature him a little more in your videos.
I totally agree, puppies are so bouncy, happy & photogenic. And Arthur has a wiggle when he walks. Oh, and that tongue out makes him look like hes saying "daddy were going for a walk? Yay!!!"
I want you to know what these videos are interesting even for non-British/non-American audiences. I, an Indonesian who barely have access to sidewalks, didn’t know that there’s so many names for the devil’s strip (this is now my favorite term). As a bonus, now I kind of understand the meaning of the word ‘terrace’ whenever my Malaysian friends talk about their housings. Cheers to that! 🍻
There is definitely a difference between green in the UK and the US. I'm so glad to hear someone else say it! Spring comes earlier in most of the US so the leaves have more time to become deep green. The UK greenery feels like perennial springtime green...until the leaves fall to the ground.
I know I'm late to the party, but I'm catching up on lots of past videos. I've lived in many states east of the Rocky Mountains and I think that in most of them the grassy area either doesn't exist or it's called an easement. Here, a few miles west of you in Aurora, IL, it's called a parkway and it is administered by the city. Parkways, which may or may not include a sidewalk, encroach on our yards anywhere from about 5 ft to upwards of 25 ft, depending on the size of the yard. The good news is that the city takes care of the trees that are planted in the parkway. They do not, however, mow, fertilize, water, etc. Welcome to the hodgepodge that is Chicagoland!
Brit here 🇬🇧. Currently sat in my garden, intensely assessing the grenliness of the trees in my periphery. I can concur that the shade of green is a rich but ultimately dark shade of green. I am visiting the USA next week so I will hopefully remember to return here to report my findings in the land of the Chick fil A.
Make sure to Report back to us Brits when you find out lol
Hah I was wondering if Chick fil a existed in the UK the other day or if it was a US thing specifically. Now I know 😊
@@KJones-qs7ju my life changed forever when I tried chick fil A sauce. Now I travel annually to America to enjoy this delicacy. In the past I’ve visited on a Sunday and then found myself very upset.
Chick Fil a sandwiches are shockingly good. Get the battered, deep fried varient. That is where they shine.
Back when every fast food place was trying to copy chick fil a, a friend of mine asked his manager (they worked at chick fil a) if he was worried about McDonald's stealing their business.
He asked as they stood in the kitchen at 5 am hand battering all the chicken for the day
The boss said he'd worry when McDonalds started hand battering all their chicken on the morning before it was served.
If you like deep fried chicken and sweet iced tea, it's hard to beat.
@@KJones-qs7ju I have never heard of it. Then again, I never hear of 5 guys until I was in the US and my friend (from the UK) and I went to one and he told me there were plenty in the UK.
This is more attention to the edge of the yard or the grass by the curb than I have,collectively, thought about in my entire life 😊
Here in Minnesota, the area between the curb and the sidewalk is the berm. Though, in the new areas they no longer put in sidewalks or put the sidewalk right up against the curb.
In YMC we call it a boulevard.
I’ve lived in Minnesota my whole life and we’ve always called it the boulevard
In my suburban childhood, we called your "verge" a tree lawn, because all along the street trees had been planted in the tree lawns! Looking up into that maple tree made me nostalgic. Where I live now, we mostly have pines, spruces and aspen, but I miss those broad-leaf trees.
In Texas it's commonly called an "easement strip" or simple an "easement". You're responsible for mowing it and keeping the tree trimmed higher than 14 feet above the street, but the city can do anything they want with it, such as put up a communal letter box, remove the tree or certain branches. This is also where the water meter is located.
I’m from Southern California and my instinct was to call it the easement though we didn’t have them there. (Grass is for The Wealthy and selfish jerks who are water wasters)
I'm Texan and didn't know it had a name 😂
I usually use easement to refer to a road that runs through someone else's property.
@@rustyroseranch Yes, basically correct. An easement is any property that YOU are expected to maintain, but the city/county/state/fed can "use". Think of a telephone pole that is mounted within your property lines, there is an easement for workers to travel to it, maintain it, replace or remove it, but you are the one maintaining the area.
That’s what we call it in Michigan as well (suburban Detroit).
Texas- Yes, we call it either the easement or "that grassy thing between the sidewalk and the street".
Verges? My parents called our grass strip a "betterment". (Massachusetts) It was harder to grow nicer grass on it because of the heat of the street asphalt would bake the soil in the summer and weed seeds would blow across the pavement and get lodged and germinate right on its edge.
In Oregon, the pipe that runs from the gutter to the ground is called the drainage pipe. A median refers to the divider in the middle of the freeway. Never heard or thought about a real name for the grass between the sidewalk and the curb. Very interesting. Thanks for sharing!
Yeah, same. Oregon raised, and when he said that PacNW called that bit of grass a median, I thought, no? A median is the strip of concrete separating the traffic directions.
Washington (state) checking in, also have no name for grassy strip. Median definitely refers to the thing in the middle of the road. Also I would have guessed downspout was British, I've only ever heard drainpipe or drainage pipe.
I’m from the east coast and I agree that the median is the divider in the middle of the highway/freeway.
I was born and raised in Oregon but now live in Florida but we grew up calling it the side median or easement.
Either one used and I would know what someone meant
I live in Oregon and never heard a name for it. A neighbor told me I'm supposed to take care of it though. Does it belong to the city or part of my property?
Local ordinances in the northern suburbs of Chicago, call the space between the sidewalk and the street a parkway.
Here in North Texas, it's called an easement where the city plants telephone poles and water meters.
We call it an easement, too (northern IL).
Wisconsin too.
I call that bit of lawn the easement, since it is usually a utility easement.
Less cloud cover in the US also means the sun can shine through the leaves, making it appear that much greener.
Btw, i did grow up in a suburb, and ours had no grassy strip as its a 40+ year old neighborhood with no sidewalks. Or curbs even. But it is very green with many mature trees. Which i absolutely love!!
In Oak Park Illinois, where I live, (close to where YOU live Laurence) we call it a "Parkway". And strangely, i have never heard it called anything else in my 62 years. "Live and learn" "Die and forget everything" as my Grandma used to say.
I am Canadian. I call it "that annoying thing no one owns but is forced to care for". Fortunately... my town has largely removed them and replaced them with trees and cobblestones so essentially, it just makes the sidewalk wider, they obviously mulch around the tree a little bit so the tree can get water but I like the cobblestone patches... We have a lot of pesticide restrictions here so grass is often mostly a whole lot of different green weeds, so it's not as lovely close up.
🇨🇦 It’s a good place to put the snow mountains that the snow plows create.
@@patriciawenzel3871 it is, but the other three months it's really just a why
Technically it is owned by His Majesty in Right of the province. I let his Majesty worry about maintaining it.
@@revcrussell yeah I think most ppl in my town who have it only maintain it if they're having to walk through it and the city doesn't do it often enough. I would be quite roar if I HAD to do it but also couldn't use it for anything, like a chair or a pot of flowers etc... I like that most of ours are cobblestone though, geese would have it nasty all summer if it was grass.
I’m 59 and live in Indiana. I didn’t know it had a name. It’s just the strip of grass by the road. My parents are from England and I have more relatives in England then here. I enjoy hearing you talk about what my family from across the pond talk about. Go Uxbridge and Swindon.
While watching a TH-cam channel on the hurricane in FL a few days ago, someone called a small building a shed. Thus began a comment frenzy. It was not a shed but a pavilion; not a pavilion but a gazebo. We ended up having a vote, which was even more divisive. 😁
And in Utah it’s called a Bowery!
😆
Had it blown away...you would have never had the great conversation..
Ohioan chiming in here. A "gazebo" is an open-air structure, something like an open-air tent (with 6 sides), but a permanent structure.
@@Cricket2731You are 100% correct in describing a Gazebo.....from Washington St.
In a suburb of Chicago, we call the grass between the sidewalk and the curb a "parkway". Just like you, I'd never heard of many of the other names. I've learned in Australia they call them "nature strips" (or at least Tim the Lawnmower Man calls them that; good man donating free lawnmowing services to persons needing a bit of help).
Grew up in the NW Chicago suburbs and always heard the strip of grass by the street called a parkway.
Parkway in Los Angeles as well.
Yep... parkway. Chicago area suburbanite. Behind the lawn of a house is the easement.
Also from Chicago nw suburbs. It's always been the parkway.
In the southwestern Chicago suburbs, we call the 'verge' the parkway.
Grew up in Minnesota and spent copious amounts of time in Eastern North Dakota, and while there were a few who called that grassy strip between sidewalk/pavement and the roadway a verge, most often it was called the boulevard. I still call it a boulevard. Some of these other names make me shake my head or giggle.
First comment I found on this video calling it a boulevard. I live in St. Paul. lol
Boulevard? That's a multi-lane two-way street in NYC.
That was curious to me because in NY, a boulevard is an extra wide street lined with trees.
Definitely a boulevard, but then I’m in a southern suburb of the Twin Cities so maybe it’s a Minnesota thing.
@@413smr Yeah, we have a few multi-lane two-way streets here we call "boulevard" too
I have lived in neither country but visited both. I think English suburbs and nature look more ‘natural’ and beautiful to me, personally. USA suburbs have more of a strange flatpack effect, though they have some of the most beautiful natural spots in national parks etc.
To be fair England has had much much longer for their natural greenery to get old and lush again, while US had most of its forests and prairies “settled” & “tamed” just a couple hundred years ago, and then modern neighborhoods put in 😅 speed was the main goal with the population boom post war, thus baby boomers.
@@laurawendt8471 that’s true.. considering that, they have done a great job
Thank you for standing up for our greenliness ❤
Also, the desire to have huge empty lawns of mostly non-native species (one of the ways European tradition was kept up by the descendants of the colonists) as a status symbol remained for the majority that now live in the suburbs. That's the reason it looks unnatural and sparse there.
A lot of that is due to how most U.S. suburbs are fairly young and were designed to house as many people as possible with the square footage modern houses tend to get. I know, that's rich when you consider how much smaller properties tend to be elsewhere, but we also have a lot more properly habitable space than most places.
A lot of it also depends on terrain, as suburbs is hillier areas do tend to follow the geography for practical (meaning it's both cheaper and faster) to generally follow the terrain. There is also the fact that there is a condition on the fact that roads also play a role, and roads follow the terrain and (usually) the path of least resistance where it comes to construction.
And suburbs come in all varieties because of this.
I call it the parkway strip.
Also homes in the East Coast usually don't have fences between yards. In the West, homes always have fenders between their yard.
I grew up in Illinois and now live in Minnesota. I’ve never heard of it having a specific name. Just “that strip of yard next to the road” or “that bit of grass that’s annoying to mow.”
I grew up in Minnesota and lived in Illinois and we never had a special name for the grass on the other side of the sidewalk except “best get it mowed, kids,” lol! 😂
I was gonna say, lived in MN my whole life and I feel like most of the terms are used for other things, but the actual strip of grass doesn't have a concrete name
I grew up in the south suburbs and my dad called it an easement because in our suburb the city owns it. There was one behind the house for an alley which never went in. The one in the front yard between the sidewalk and the street was huge! Long after we moved out, a center turn lane was built into route 83 and the easement is not as huge anymore.
Yep, easement over here.
I've lived in New Jersey my entire life and I've never heard the term "grass bay". In South Jersey (near Philadelphia) we call it a "tree lawn". Lawrence, you always bring a smile to my face please keep it up!
Tree Lawn
I've lived in Northern California most of my life and have never heard of a "mow strip". I've always known it as "the parking".
In Chicago, we call that strip of land between the street and sidewalk a parkway. I’m surprised Laurence didn’t know that.
Sidewalk and median make perfect sense. You walk on the side of the road and the median is "in the middle" of the road to divide it.
Colorado reporting in... We call it a median.
Facts
Montana here and I have only ever heard it called a median 🤷🏽♀️
As a fellow Illinoisan, I can’t believe you left out “parkway” which is what everyone I know calls it. 😮 Maybe that memo got lost in the pond - or Great Lake. 😁
Parkway ftw!
I'm from Southern California and we call it parkway.
@@blueyedtopher In Kansas, we drive on parkways and park on driveways.
Northwest Indiana calls it Parkway too.
The “greenliness” of American trees also is different in the fall.
Apparently the amazing red colors of fall leaves is distinctly an American/east Asian thing as basically every other tree just goes yellow when they lose their leaves for the winter.
I have been to America in the Autumn, and I was just a little disappointed with the colours. Yes, not so many of our trees in the UK turn red, but some do. On returning home from our holiday I thought our trees put on an equally beautiful display. I believe the weather can influence the colour of the leaves which need a cold dry spell to look their best, sometimes we just get damp mild weather which spoils the show!
@@marypiper8161 The species of tree also figures large into the color its leaves turn. In the Northeast US, particularly, we tend to have a lot of maple trees, which usually turn brilliant scarlet in the Fall, same as the Japanese versions. Warm, dry weather preceding the leaf turnings also encourages predominance of anthocyanins in leaves of trees that produce them at all.
@@marypiper8161 I should say the north east part of the US definitely have more vibrant colors in the fall than some other parts.
@@markman278 Yes it was New Hampshire , Maine and Acadia National Park we visited .we did have a memorable time , I particularly loved Bar Harbor.
According to my brother, a tree surgeon, the vibrancy of the autumn/fall colours is as a result of the weather and how rapid the transition from summer to autumn climate is.
It's something to do with the amount of sunshine the leaves are absorbing Vs how rapidly they stop photosynthesis and the resulting build up of sugars retained in the leaves.
So in the US, especially further inland, the seasonal transition tends to be both rapid and consistent, so there are more residual sugars left in the leaves (I think) resulting in more vibrancy.
Basically, long hot summers with lots of sunshine and a quick transition to fall equals a more colourful display.
Whereas in the UK, being an island and therefore subject to much less consistent weather patterns (lots more contributing factors) the seasonal transition *can* be more incremental and the trees are subject to less sunshine in the summer months. So they usually manage to process more of the sugars before the leaves are shed, hence the colour of the autumn leaves tend to be more subdued, but every now and again we might get a good spell of sunshine in late summer that results in a nicer autumn display.
There are other factors, like air pollution, that can also have an impact; I dare say that the air quality is far superior in American suburbs than in Central London, for example.
And as someone else pointed out, the Hue of the leaves (as opposed to the vibrancy) is dependent on the species of tree.
Apologies for the rather long-winded explanation, which is coming second hand from someone who knows what they are talking about via someone who doesn't, but I hope that makes sense. It did when it was explained to me 😂
I left your channel for a while and came back and I think your content has really gone to the next level while I was away! I appreciate all the research you are doing. Very interesting.
In the San Francisco Bay Area we call it a parking strip.
I suspect the vibrancy of the greenery in America depends on where one lives. Chicago gets rain in the summer, so things tend to stay green. Where I live, we get very little rain for six months out of the year, so things tend to not be as green a lot of the time.
I want to thank you for not being so Anti-American. I get that people will think and say whatever they want, but it is remarkably refreshing to find a person who isn't originally from America who doesn't insult us that much or in your case at all. And I know there has to be other folks like you, you're one of the few I have personally encountered. I honestly wish that I could financially support you, but instead I can just say keep being you!
He has been living there, since 2008, and is now an American citizen. For him to make videos trashing America wouldn't make sense.
Well, he did choose to live there. Immigrants do tend to be more patriotic like that.
@@sweiland75 Wasn't making a statement against that. Was just saying thank you for being kind. Have been marking some channels as do not show me this crap for a couple of days.... so, I found all his videos refreshing and said as much.
@@edgarbanuelos6472 Again, as I said to the other commenter, wasn't making a statement against it - just thanking him for being kind.
@@sadiejane2781 I was just trying to add on to your comment. I'm glad you acknowledged it
I live in Massachusetts, raised in New York. Most often, I call a verge “a verge,” except when there isn’t actually a sidewalk present, then it’s called “an easement.” The town technically owns the easements, and they have a right to do things like lay water mains or utility lines underneath them, or build sidewalks upon them (thus creating a verge). You still have to maintain and mow the portion that abuts your property, though.
You mentioned a “Common,” and that is a uniquely New England thing, but it’s not a verge. In many New England towns, a “Common” was common land owned by the town and used for pasturage, meetings, commerce, and even as a burial ground. In my town, the Common is the parcel of green space associated with a large Unitarian Universalist church in the center of town. It’s jointly maintained by the church and the town, and it’s used for things like fairs, festivals, incredibly polite protests, official Christmas-tree lightings, and, with the addition of portable fencing, a Biergarten. Since it’s bordered on one edge by a public sidewalk, the Town Common ironically has its very own verge.
@ lachimiste1
.......And shovel the sidewalk during the winter months - requirement since it is considered common land.
Yes! The village greens in NE and the old villages upstate NY are very nice. Some even have an elevated, roofed
pavilion called a bandstand. Very nice ..... So long as the people in the community respect the common space
(i.e. don't litter, clean up after their dogs, respect the older folks sitting on the benches, and walking along the
sidewalks within the park etc.) A playground is usually nearby for the children to romp. Originally these places
were where churches were built (and used as graveyards by the original settlers)[1], as well as the first school for
the village being on one side of green.
________________________________________
1.) In the 1800's the rural cemetery movement encouraged these churches to have their members buried in
the new cemetery in the nearby the village. Some churches (most) opted to have their buried members
removed and re-interred in the new cemetery
This is weird because I grew up in a UK suburb with front lawns, verges and lots of trees, which I took very much for granted. Then I got to an age where having friends who didn't live anywhere nearby started happening. One visiting friend remarked "it's so GREEN (here)" and I was not even remotely able to respond to that.
Was it in something that was originally planned as a Garden City? That was a UK urban model in the early 20th century.
@@bradleyheck7204 Not that I know of. In fact there were (and still are) similarly named streets nearby with no verges, and a lot of nearby industry, but unless you wandered into the heart of that, you were almost always within sight of a couple of trees or a lawn, if not both.
I live in Northern California, and am an Anglophile, have visited the UK many times.. while English villages are very beautiful and charming. I think American suburbs are much more tractive than UK suburbs for some of the reasons you mentioned.. they have large lawns in front of them, and they have verges which gives you protection from traffic. But there are regional differences. I remember visiting the Midwest several years ago, and noticing that they tend not to have fences between their houses - everything is open I think that’s because Midwesterners are very trusting of their neighbors, and very open to their neighbors. Nor do they have backyard fences . All ready to go in California everybody has a fence or a wall around their property. Or at least a hedge between their house and their neighbors.
Midwesterner here. I mean, the fence isn't necessary unless you have a dog. You'd have to be insane to just wander into someone's yard, and anything of value is either in the house or in a (generally locked) shed or garage. (Really anything you don't want destroyed over the winter or knocked over by deer goes in the shed) Unless you're just worried about your neighbors stepping on your plants or something. But why would they do that? Plus a fence means no one can park on the lawn when there's a big get-together. It's much more common to fence your backyard for privacy and to let your dogs run in it, but by no means is it necessary. Front yard is mostly for show, or to stand on and look at your neighbor's yards from. Most stuff happens in the backyard. I don't understand why no fences is a sign of trust though. Anyone insane enough to walk on random people's lawns could just open the gate. Unless you guys put locks on your fences???
Also if you like your neighbors you might even add an empty spot or gate to a fence so you can hang out easier. Otherwise just lean against the fence and talk.
Californians need fences because they let the thugs win. Criminals have more rights than homeowners. It’s why people are leaving.
Cheers
I'm from Syracuse NY, which I figure is the Gateway to the Midwest, culturally and linguistically. Right in the city there's a mix of fenced and unfenced properties, but out in the suburbs it's uncommon to fence the yards.
One of the big differences is that there is much more space in the US for people and housing. In Britain, England in particular, space is at a premium. We must be the most densely populated country on Earth. If ever the American proverb "good fences make good neighbours" applies anywhere it is England.
I'm 76 and have lived in Connecticut all my life; I only recently found out "that bit of grass" was called a verge. Also, it's not Just suburbs that have this. I grew up in Hartford which is the capitol of Connecticut and all streets have this bit of grass and usually small/tiny front lawns. I was terribly shocked the first time I was in a "real" city and people's front rooms were literally on the sidewalk.
They’re common in Chicago, too.
I grew up in a real city and we had these it’s of grass between the sidewalk and the street.
In Dutch we also call it a 'berm'. Different pronunciation of course, but very likely to be connected to each other. How lovely
This is super interesting to me. I grew up in WI learning that a berm is a small hill or raised strip built on the property, behind the sidewalk in the yard, to dampen road noise or serve as a sort of fence.
Berm is used for the grassy side of the road. Mostly there is no sidewalk for pedestrians in that case. I realize that in the Netherlands sidewalks are mostly directly adjacent to the road. So there is a berm or there is a sidewalk (trottoir or stoep)
I've lived in the Chicago suburbs my entire life. My parents were born in the city. I've ALWAYS heard it referred to as a parkway.
In my part of Canada, verges are called boulevards. Which is nice in a way: we have a word for these areas. The frustrating thing is that there are also boulevards, which are streets with a median in the... median. The median of a boulevard (street) can be grass or concrete or whatever. You really have to watch context with 'boulevard' because of this.
An interesting video. I just call it the strip of lawn between the sidewalk and street. I never thought about how the frequent cloudiness in the UK would affect the greenliness of the plants and trees, though it makes perfect sense. Your puppy dog, Arthur, isd so cute and adorable!
The thing is, in periods of no cloud, and therefore no rain, the grass just dries out and yellows and dies.
I'm American but have spent a huge amount of time in England over decades, and you're absolutely right - the green in the US is more vibrant. Very observant! (I'm NJ born and bred - never heard of "grass bay").
Agreed. From NJ and never heard of "grass bay" either.
Another New Jerseyan chiming in to say I've never heard the term "grass bay" before. I've always called it "the grass near the sidewalk".
The long straight border between US and Canada is the 49th parallel. This parallel also passes by Jersey, the Channel Island off the French coast - this every bit of Great Britain is considerably further north than the entire contiguous 48 states ( as well as Hawaii, of course). While it is warmed by the Gulf Stream, Great Britain does not get nearly the strength of sunshine that the US does. It will get longer days in the summer, but the rays are still at such a much lower angle, that they do not as effectively fuel photosynthesis.
Me either!
I think another thing about the US is that the sky is bluer, especially in the south, like Texas. I believe it has to do with proximity to the equator.
In the city of Seattle, Washington State, this area is called a planting strip. I've also heard it called a parking strip. A median is the area between 2 directions of a freeway. A swale is a planting strip that has been dug out to provide a rain garden for water running off of the street.
Not a freeway here…
Australia has multiple names for the grass strip as well. I have heard it called the verge, nature strip, council strip, council stripe council easement and grass strip.
I'm an Englishman living in Australia. Much of what you observe in the US also applies to Aus.
In Melbourne we call the verge a 'nature strip'.
Love your work😁
Australians & New Zealanders do tend to pickup up most naming variants from the UK & USA on top of any local variants, you could use any of the common terms interchangeably and most people would understand you perfectly well. (it can be quite common to use multiple names for the same thing in a single statement), where as compared to a large number of my colleagues from America who would get stumped on certain terms/names that were not from their region when they first arrived.
Berm/Verge/Nature Strip/Council Strip, Sidewalk/footpath, Trash Can/Rubbish Bin/Garbage Can/Dumpster, Boot/Trunk, Bonnet/Hood, Restroom/Toilet/Bathroom/Dunny/Shitter etc
Having lived in Australia for 3 years, they should also call it a "parking strip."
The legal term for that strip is called a planting strip. This refers to the green space between the sidewalk and the road. I wondered as well, so I looked it up in the property law dictionary. Yes there IS such a thing. There are actually laws and regulations about how wide it should be and where it can and can’t be. Normally the sidewalk is the edge of the right of way minus one inch. Thus the sidewalk and planting strip are both in the right of way. Some localities specify a different margin, half an inch, sometimes 3 inches.
Im curious when you say legal term, does that mean for american law? Federal or state? And is it uniform from state to state?
Most property law is state law, though. At least pertaining to real property.
Here in NC that is what it is most often called, I think
I've always called the verge the "planting strip" or the "parking strip" (from the Seattle area)
I grew up in areas that didn't have sidewalks at all, so we had no name for that grass strip. As an adult I moved to an urban area with no lawns, where the fronts of the houses are next to the sidewalk. I've since moved to suburbs where the most common pattern is that commercial/apartment building zones have sidewalk extending from building to road and single-family homes have small front yards but no sidewalk. All of these locations were in different regions of the US. I've seen the grass strips, but never lived around them somehow. I didn't know there was even any specific term for them until recently.
In Denver, we called the tree lawn, the historic use of it was to plant trees. Like much of the Midwest trees do not naturally occur. We are high plains, so every tree has to be planted in. This was a way of providing a space for trees to help shade the sidewalk and to create a more beautiful Urbanspace. It’s interesting to see pictures taken around the 1900s of Denver and you’ll see small one to 2 inch caliper trees everywhere. Now those trees are fully mature and provide a beautiful canopy for the city.
Denver is in the Midwest? I thought it was in the Rockies.
Nice to know that in the UK, the verge is actually the responsibility of the local council. I do remove litter, but at least I don't have to mow it. 😁
Where I am there are more wild flowers in the local verges, due to my London suburb, being built on old farmland, so there are also mostly healthy trees, new and old, of various varieties, along with plentiful wildlife, birds of many species, mammals, like foxes, rat and mice, local domestic and feral cats, local dogs and all the insects, bumblebee, honey bees, moths and butterflies, loads of worms, etc.
In this corner of Indiana, the green strip between the sidewalk and the street is a parkway.
That strip between the sidewalk and the street is part of the city’s ROW (right of way). It allows the city to widen roads if needed because of population growth or rezoning in the area. The part between the sidewalk and your house is your front yard, lawn, garden, etc. Typically flowers are planted in the front yard while gardens (vegetables, herbs, and fruits) are planted in the backyard.
Captain Obvious!
@@michelledeer7659 Thank you, and have a blessed day.
I've lived my whole life in the northwest suburbs of Chicago and have only known that strip of grass as a "Parkway".
Love all your videos, and your new word - grenliness!! 😊❤
I've lived my whole life in Southern California, and we also call it the parkway. 🌳
Chicago western suburbanite here to say I’ve only ever heard it called a parkway.
Where I am in Texas we've always called it a parkway. We have more than one horse in town so that could be because of our more urban nature here.
You know what? This video is literally the first time in my life I've ever heard anyone mention the grass between the sidewalk and the road, so I can't say what they would have called it if they had. Now that I'm thinking about it, it's honestly weird that I haven't heard anyone talk about such a ubiquitous thing, yet here we are.
I live in north-central Illinois. The "verge" is called a "parkway" here.
In Northeast Ohio, we typically call the strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street a "tree lawn". I am no authority on this matter but I assume it is because we primarily plant trees in that strip and in some municipalities, the street department is responsible for maintenance of those trees because of their proximity to overhead power/telecom lines. The "devil strip" thing is mostly limited to Akron, OH and suburbs (I live in that area).
Hello, neighbor!
When I lived in Massillon, it was called a devils strip. Now living in Dalton it's called a tree lawn.
Warren, it's also devil strip
I'm from NE Ohio and would agree up until ten years ago. The devil strip inspired a mini-business boom of that same name a few years back and the name caught on, even more. Now I hear it a lot of places in the region. Hello my fellow Buckeyes ❤
So strange. I spent two summers studying at Oxford in the UK, and visited the English and Welsh countryside. I thought the green of the sheep pastures was far more vibrant than anything in America, and I grew up in Kentucky (known for it's "bluegrass", which is actually just disappointingly green). The grass is always greener on the other side of the pond, I guess! Here in northeast Florida, we call that grassy strip on the other side of the sidewalk an "easement".
Yes, I've always found Britain to be much greener than the rest of Europe and the places I've visited in the States (hotter parts, admittedly).
I always assumed it was down to our annual precipitation which is pretty evenly distributed throughout the year.
Correct it is an easement. I lived in Ky it is a beautiful state. My great great grandfather got a scholarship to Oxford university. He went to Worcester college and became a vicar. His brother went to Lincoln and became a surgeon. They grew up in Oxford and their uncle ( mom’s brother ) was the mayor of Oxford. Probably why I had a dictionary at age 6 and I had to look up words that I didn’t understand when reading a book.
Grew up far south side of Chicago. We referred to the strip of grass as the parkway. Interesting to hear all the different terms!
It was the same in the northern suburbs
Funnily enough I saw a video that explained that’s why cars ‘park’ and an area for leaving your car is called a ‘car park’ because when car ownership took off they were cluttering up the high streets so they removed the parkways and paved them as a zone to leave your car hence park way became a car park.
I’m from the UK and we, as he said call them verges, but we still inherited the American terminology of parking and car parks.
We called it a parkway in the West Suburbs as well.
Boulevard in my eastern South Dakota city
Illinois, south of Chicago. It’s parkway or median. We love our grenness!
I’m in Southern California. We call the grass strip between the street and the sidewalk, the “Park way.”
I live in Southern California. We called the strip of grass nearest the street a parkway. I had no idea there were so many names for this plot of land. Glad you brought up the location of street signs. That is one of the first things I noticed when I first visited England. 😊
Wow. I didn't know other Americans called the grass between the yard and the street as "verges" etc.. In the Utah (in places where there are actually sidewalks) we call them "park strips."
Growing up in northern California, we referred to the "verge", or however it's spelled, as the parking strip.
Also, I picked up on Laurence's pronunciation of dictionary that sounds decidedly more American.