Avenue Meaning
/ˈæv.əˌnjuː/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounA broad street, especially one bordered by trees or, in cities laid out in a grid pattern, one that is on a particular side of the city or that runs in a particular direction.
nounA way or opening for entrance into a place; a passage by which a place may be reached; a way of approach or of exit.
Sentence Examples
The ambulance broke down in the middle of the busy avenue.
We walked along an avenue of tall poplars.
Synonyms & Antonyms
Synonyms:
Antonyms:
None
CEFR Practice Quiz
The city planners decided to plant trees along every broad ____ in the new district.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
They walked down the wide ____ lined with large and tall oak trees.
Word Origin & History
Borrowed from French avenue, from Old French avenue, feminine past participle of avenir (“approach”), from Latin adveniō, advenīre (“come to”, from ad (“to”) + veniō, venīre (“come”)).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Finding an address east to west is fairly simple . The numbering begins at Central Avenue and moves logically and predictably either west through the avenues or east through the streets, so you know that 2400 East Camelback is at Twenty-Fourth Street or 4300 West Indian School is at Forty-Third Avenue ."
— 2009, Carrie Frasure, Arizona Off the Beaten Path®: A Guide to Unique Places, →ISBN, page 111:
"Boulevards typically (but not exclusively) go east to west; avenues usually run north to south."
— 2011, Time Out Los Angeles, →ISBN, page 78:
"The City of New York implemented a unified street grid in Queens: Numbered avenues run east–west; numbered streets run north–south."
— 2014, Adrienne Onofri, Walking Queens, →ISBN:
"[S]ome have used to get on the top of the higheſt Steeple, vvhere one may vievv with advantage, all the Countrey circumjacent, and the ſite of the City, vvith the advenues and approaches about it; and ſo take a Landskip of it."
— 1642, James Howell, “Section III”, in Instructions for Forreine Travell. […], London: […] T. B. for Humprey Mosley [i.e., Humphrey Moseley] […], →OCLC, page 32:
"They said nothing further, but tramped on in the growing darkness, past farm steadings, into the little village, through the silent churchyard where generations of the Pallisers lay, and up the beech avenue that led to Northrop Hall."
— 1907 January, Harold Bindloss, chapter 1, in The Dust of Conflict, 1st Canadian edition, Toronto, Ont.: McLeod & Allen, →OCLC:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The city planners decided to plant trees along every broad ____ in the new district.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
They walked down the wide ____ lined with large and tall oak trees.