English

The tree-lined grassy area to the right is a nature strip

Noun

nature strip ‎(plural nature strips)

1. (Australia, regional) An area of grass beside a roadway, possibly with a few trees or shrubs, lying between the roadway proper and the footpath, if there is one; a tree lawn.
   • 1985, Peter Carey, Illywhacker, Faber and Faber 2003, page 142:

     I imagine myself in a suburban street in Melbourne on a chilly autumn afternoon, the postman blowing his whistle, a dog crossing the road to pee on those three-feet-wide strips of grass beside the road that are known as ‘nature strips’.

   • 2004, Australian High Court, The Australian Law Journal Reports, Volume 78, page 572,

     Between the service road and the highway was a densely foliaged nature strip. There was a path across the nature strip that was frequently used by pedestrians to cross the service road.

   • 2005, Maurilia Meehan, The Bad Seed, unnumbered page,

     In their lime-green flat she had no garden, which was why she had taken over the nature strip. […] Neighbours mowed their green-jube nature strips bordering Agatha′s garden and did not report her to the local council.

   • 2009, Mary Horsfall, Creating Your Eco-Friendly Garden, CSIRO Publishing, page 107,

     This is a town with a culture of nature strip gardens. Along our road there are no footpaths, but there are wide nature strips on which many residents have planted gardens of one sort or another.

Usage notes

There are significant dialectal differences globally for this concept; see tree lawn for details and synonyms.

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