sidewalk

sidewalk superintendent

slang Someone who observes a construction or demolition job with great interest from a vantage point outside of the job site, such as the sidewalk. There was a whole crowd of sidewalk superintendents gathered around to see the historic theater being leveled to the ground. Apparently I was quite the sidewalk superintendent as a child, spending hours watching construction crews go about their business.
See also: sidewalk

sidewalk surfer

Someone who rides a skateboard, especially as a means of transportation rather than to do tricks. This town is full of sidewalk surfers zipping by on their way to class or work. I used to be a sidewalk surfer when I was in college, but after breaking my ankle I never got back on a board again.
See also: sidewalk, surfer

sidewalk surfing

The act of skateboarding, or an instance of such, especially when used as transportation rather than for doing tricks. The older people in my neighborhood give me funny looks whenever they see me out sidewalk surfing. This town is known for its sidewalk surfing. In fact, you tend to see more people going to work on skateboards than on bicycles.
See also: sidewalk, surfing
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

sidewalk superintendent

1. n. someone who—out of curiosity—watches excavations being dug and buildings being built. All day, the lines of sidewalk superintendents oozed by.
2. n. any critic. If another sidewalk superintendent comes in here and tries to tell me how to manage this office, heads will roll.
See also: sidewalk

sidewalk surfing

n. skateboarding. Bill spent a lot of time sidewalk surfing until the town passed an ordinance against it.
See also: sidewalk, surfing
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions
See also:
  • sidewalk superintendent
  • set (one) up with (someone or something)
  • set up
  • ease someone into (something)
  • give (one) the sack
  • land (something)
  • land a job
  • on the job
  • ease into (something)
  • a good innings
References in periodicals archive
'The project to repair and improve public sidewalks and pavements along Russian Federation Boulevard will make Phnom Penh more beautiful.
"As such, this bill aims to penalize the use of public roads and sidewalks for commercial and personal purposes," the former Marine captain said.
Dubbed Quayside, the 12-acre development aims to become the "global hub of a new industry focused on urban innovation to improve the quality of city life," with a focus on energy efficiency and decreasing the city's carbon footprint, according to Sidewalk Labs (https://sidewalktoronto.ca/) website.
Waterfront Toronto issued a request for a partner in March 2017 and announced its choice of Sidewalk Labs in October.
The implications of her Critical Cartography 2.0 are made evident in Chapter 6, where she lays out a proposal for training tourists to focus their attention on the city's sidewalks. She details a packaged experience for tourists to draw their gaze, not upwards toward the stately and majestic buildings of the colonial era, but on the sidewalks themselves in all their lived vitality.
Chapters Three and Four discuss the cartographic and methodological orientations through which Kim and her team have documented the relationships of HCMC's sidewalks with time, social relations and economic activities.
Plaintiff countered that West River breached its statutory duty by allowing its sidewalk flag to fall into disrepair and, in any event, failed to demonstrate its entitlement to summary judgment because it did not show that it maintained its sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition.
7 -- County Club Plaza, 490 Lincoln St., for an unshoveled sidewalk.
"Even though [most] communities have ordinances that place the responsibility for sidewalk maintenance on the adjacent property owner, shared and unclear responsibility, weak enforcement mechanisms, high costs, and liability concerns lead many jurisdictions to perform sidewalk repairs and replacement [themselves]," says Tom Huber of Toole Design Group, who served as the project manager with the contractor that developed the guide.
Next to Lane Community College's new downtown campus and housing complex on West 10th Avenue the sidewalk width varies from 11 feet to more than 13 feet.
The councillors further recommended that the Strategic Executives of Urban Planning and Property Management as part of the building plan approval process, calculate the monthly sidewalk rent tariff applicable and indicate this amount on the building file.
* Mary Welsh, on behalf of the Brant Waterways Foundation, advised that a request had been received from the Hardy Terrace nursing home to extend the sidewalk at the north end of Mount Pleasant by 125 feet so that wheelchair residents and family members could safely access the sidewalk.
On the other hand, Sandfort and Runck (1986) and Sandfort (1997) suggested that other factors, such as soil characteristics, may be more important relative to sidewalk failure.
Work began this week and is not related to a sidewalk project the town has been working on for later this fall.
A study on the current situation revealed that olive trees cause dislocating the slabs of the sidewalks because of their huge roots, further, the branches of the olive trees occupy the whole space area of the sidewalk, which forces the pedestrians to walk away and go down to the street.