skid row

[ roh ]

noun

1. an area of cheap barrooms and run-down hotels, frequented by alcoholics and vagrants.

skid row

/ rəʊ /

noun

1. slang.
   a dilapidated section of a city inhabited by vagrants, etc

Word History and Origins

Origin of skid row¹

1930–35, Americanism; earlier skid road an area of a town frequented by loggers, originally a skidway

Idioms and Phrases

A squalid district inhabited by derelicts and vagrants; also, a life of impoverished dissipation. For example, That part of town is our skid row , or His drinking was getting so bad we thought he was headed for skid row . This expression originated in the lumber industry, where it signified a road or track made of logs laid crosswise over which logs were slid. Around 1900 the name Skid Road was used for the part of a town frequented by loggers, which had many bars and brothels, and by the 1930s the variant skid row , with its current meaning, came into use.

Example Sentences

“On the Bowery,” the director Lionel Rogosin’s classic portrait of life on skid row, is not only a time capsule of a bygone New York, but also of a bygone form of documentary filmmaking.

From New York Times

Faced with a desperate financial situation, one of the largest owners of affordable housing on skid row is trying to transfer all its buildings.

From Los Angeles Times

The rapper spends nine days living among the dangerous and the destitute of skid row for his new documentary.

From Los Angeles Times

In February, The Los Angeles Times reported that sanitation crews demolished an unofficial community-resource center in the city’s skid row in what officials called a regular cleanup.

From New York Times

Access to basic sanitation in skid row falls far short of international standards for refugee camps.

From Los Angeles Times