A road or path designed and maintained for carriages and wheeled vehicles to travel on; in British English, specifically the part of a road where traffic travels.
Carriage + way (path or route). This compound term solidified in the 18th century as roads were increasingly engineered to accommodate the growing number of wheeled vehicles.
The term 'carriageway' is still the official term in UK road law today—British motorways have 'near-side carriageways' and 'far-side carriageways,' keeping alive a word that dates back centuries.
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