culvert

plural culverts

1. A channel crossing under a road or railway for the draining of water.

   A raft of twigs stayed upon a stone, suddenly detached itself, and floated towards the culvert.

   1922 October 26, Virginia Woolf, Jacob’s Room, Richmond, London: […] Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, →OCLC; republished London: The Hogarth Press, 1960, →OCLC, page 98

   2 more examples

   After she left, I ran away for a day, and hid myself, solitary, in a culvert under the railway lines.

   1996, Janette Turner Hospital, Oyster, paperback edition, Virago Press, page 167

   It was on the leisurely upswing when, 16 years after we bought our house, a woman driving a fancy S.U.V. jumped the culvert, plowed through the hedge, jumped the culvert again and sped off.

   2024 July 15, Heidi Julavits, “I Put Up a Fence in Maine. Why Did It Cause Such a Fuss?”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

present singular third person culverts · participle present culverting · participle past culverted · past culverted

1. intransitivetransitiveTo channel (a stream of water) through a culvert.

   This led to a great deal of straightening and culverting, which in turn led to a massive loss of biodiversity.

   2020, Ben Aaronovitch, False Value, Gollancz, pages 234–235