An alley or alleyway is a narrow lane, path, or passageway, often reserved for pedestrians [步行者], which usually runs between, behind, or within buildings in the older parts of towns and cities. It is also a rear access or service road (back lane), or a path, walk, or avenue (French allée) in a park or garden.

A covered alley or passageway, often with shops, may be called an arcade.

Hutongs are a type of narrow streets or alleys, commonly associated with northern Chinese cities, most prominently [easily seen] Beijing. In Beijing, hutongs are alleys formed by lines of siheyuan, traditional courtyard residences. The term "hutong" appeared first during the Yuan Dynasty, and is a term of Mongolian origin meaning "town".

Following the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, many of the old hutongs of Beijing disappeared, replaced by wide boulevards [大街] and high-rises [高层楼房]. Many residents left the lanes where their families lived for generations for apartment buildings with modern amenities [方便设施].

Many hutongs, some several hundred years old, in the vicinity [临近] of the Bell Tower and Drum Tower and Shichahai Lake are preserved amongst recreated contemporary [当代] two- and three-storey versions.

The Shanghai longtang is loosely equivalent to the hutong of Beijing. A longtang is a laneway in Shanghai and, by extension, a community centred on a laneway or several interconnected [相互连接的] laneways. 弄 is a Chinese term for "alley" or "lane", which is often left untranslated [不翻译] in Chinese addresses, but may also be translated as "lane", and 堂 is a parlor or hallway.

In typography [印刷术], alley is also used to refer to the gap between two columns of text.

A bowling alley is a building where the game of bowling [保龄球] is played. NEW ALLEY...Construction was nearly completed on a new 10 lane bowling alley, scheduled to open in August at a cost of $171,395.97.

An alley is a technical term in track and field [田径] to describe a technique in staging the start of a track race with multiple athletes sharing multiple lanes (for example, three runners sharing two lanes would use four alleys to allow 12 athletes to participate in a lane race like the start of an 800 metres)