Plural of beltway; highways that form a ring around a city, allowing traffic to bypass the downtown area.
Compound of 'belt' (a band encircling) + 'way' (path or road). The concept of ring highways became popular in the mid-20th century, with the most famous being the Capital Beltway around Washington, D.C.
The term 'beltway' became culturally loaded—it's now shorthand for Washington, D.C. politics itself ("inside the Beltway"), representing a disconnected political elite. The physical ring road became a metaphor for how insular power structures can be.
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