naturalplastic wrote:
Actually...I am not sure that the word "style" for that structure you're talking about (stairs over a fence) doesn't exist in American English as well. Not sure because that thing has never come in conversation in my life for some odd reason. So I don't know what an American would call the thing. Lol!
That may be cultural/historical as much as linguistic. Here in the UK we have a network of public footpaths (pedestrian only) and bridleways (for horse riding) which have been rights of way for centuries - notably, long before most of the common-land was divided into separate farms by "acts of enclosure". When the land was enclosed, the boundaries very often didn't respect the existing rights of way, so the paths have a habit of crossing through the parcels of land rather than going around them - hence the need to cross fences and walls in places where the land-owner wouldn't need to for access or moving livestock. Oh, and "stile" is the correct spelling for these.
To give you an idea what I mean, here's the
local footpaths map for my district (may be a bit slow to load, and you'll need to zoom in quite a bit) - all of the spider's-web of purple lines are public rights of way for walkers!
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