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.