In Australian and New Zealand English, a quarter acre is a term for a suburban plot of land. Traditionally, Australians and New Zealanders aspire to own a 3- or 4-bedroom house or bungalow on a section of around a quarter of an acre (about 1,000 square metres), also known locally as the Australian Dream or the New Zealand dream. The land was frequently put to use with vegetable gardens, fruit trees, or lawns for family recreation.
The quarter-acre aspiration has changed in recent decades, with sub-divisions, infill housing, apartments, and townhouses becoming more common in large cities, and nearby lifestyle farming blocks becoming popular. Most "quarter-acre" sections are not exactly a quarter of an acre. With urban growth, properties tend to be smaller.
Famous quotes containing the words quarter and/or acre:
“Like the water, the Walden ice, seen near at hand, has a green tint, but at a distance is beautifully blue, and you can easily tell it from the white ice of the river, or the merely greenish ice of some ponds, a quarter of a mile off.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I would not have every man nor every part of a man cultivated, any more than I would have every acre of earth cultivated: part will be tillage, but the greater part will be meadow and forest, not only serving an immediate use, but preparing a mould against a distant future, by the annual decay of the vegetation which it supports.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)