service road

American

noun

frontage road.

service road British

noun

a relatively narrow road running parallel to a main road and providing access to houses, shops, offices, factories, etc, situated along its length

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of service road

First recorded in 1935–40

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

A few months later, a dead lamb was discovered near a service road.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 1, 2026

There were also plans for an underground service road to separate VIP visitors from refuse collections, a new staff entrance, a cafe and "recreation facilities" in the basement.

From BBC • Dec. 29, 2025

The plaza, once an underused service road near 103rd Street and Roosevelt Avenue, was redesigned in 2012 as a public square.

From New York Times • Aug. 5, 2023

Unmarked police cars soon trapped the targeted car on an Arlington Boulevard service road.

From Washington Post • Dec. 31, 2022

At Clara’s command they turned onto a service road and continued among birches and onion fields until she ordered the driver to pull up along a clump of underbrush.

From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023