concourse

American  

[kon-kawrs, -kohrs, kong-] / ˈkɒn kɔrs, -koʊrs, ˈkɒŋ- /

noun

• concourses
  plural

1. an assemblage; gathering.

   a concourse of people.

2. a driveway or promenade, especially in a park.

3. a boulevard or other broad thoroughfare.

4. a large open space for accommodating crowds, as in a railroad station.

5. an area or grounds for racing, athletic sports, etc.

6. an act or instance of running or coming together; confluence.

   a concourse of events.

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concourse British  

/ ˈkɒnkɔːs, ˈkɒŋ- /

noun

1. a crowd; throng

2. a coming together; confluence

   a concourse of events

3. a large open space for the gathering of people in a public place

4. a ground for sports, racing, athletics, etc

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• concourses
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of concourse

1350–1400; Middle English concours < Middle French; replacing Middle English concurs < Latin concursus assembly, verbal noun corresponding to concurrere to assemble, collide. See concur, course

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Explanation

The wide, open area that's either inside or in front of a building is called a concourse. A concourse is often located where many paths or hallways meet. Many kinds of buildings have a concourse, including train stations, airports, hotels, and shopping malls. Concourses are large enough for many people to congregate there — and this crowd or gathering of people can also be called a concourse. A movie star visiting a small city might find himself surrounded by a huge concourse of fans asking for autographs. The Latin root is concursus, "a running together," and the word's original sense was "the flowing of a crowd of people."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

concourse concourses

"The baggage hall was the worst and they're very lucky that there wasn't any sort of incident as tempers frayed and the concourse was getting hotter."

From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026

But the Aerotrain designers did not see fit to extend the line to concourse D, in part because both C and D were built in the ’80s as temporary concourses meant to be replaced.

From Slate ● Aug. 18, 2026

In that case, you will likely find yourself traveling to or from the concourse on a wretched holdover of mid-century transportation design: the people mover.

From Slate ● Aug. 18, 2026

Fans wrapped around the concourse and emptied the merchandise stand before the delayed first pitch and witnessed a torch passing between the league’s current players and past women’s baseball legends.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 2, 2026

To get an idea of where she might hide a book, Emily did an online search for images of the music concourse and discovered there would be a fountain.

From "Book Scavenger" by Jennifer Chambliss Bertman

Like most large international airports, Dulles has an internal train line to carry people from the terminal to the various concourses and back.

From Slate ● Aug. 18, 2026

New concourses, expanded corridors and improved passenger facilities have reshaped the transit hub, which serves hundreds of thousands of commuters and travelers each day and remains the busiest rail station in the United States.

From Salon ● Jul. 25, 2026

It is a competition famous for producing stories worthy of retelling on stadium concourses around the country, and across generations.

From BBC ● Jan. 11, 2026

Wasserman called the skyway remodel a “zombie project,” left over from a paused terminal expansion that included plans for two new concourses, “still moving forward on its own inertia.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 15, 2025

Shoppers walked around us on the concourses, their mouths moving, talking to people who weren’t there.

From "Feed" by M.T. Anderson

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