buffer zone

noun

: a neutral area separating conflicting forces

broadly : an area designed to separate

Examples of buffer zone in a Sentence

There must be a 500-foot buffer zone between the river and the new buildings.

Recent Examples on the Web

Those attacks have prompted the Russians to retake land in recent weeks to create a buffer zone that Mr. Putin has said will make cross-border attacks harder for Ukraine to carry out. —Kim Barker, New York Times, 15 May 2024

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Moscow wants to create a buffer zone inside Ukraine, which the Kremlin depicts as a necessary defensive measure — a position Ukraine calls ludicrous since Russia started the war and could end it by pulling back its forces. —Laura King, Los Angeles Times, 10 May 2024

All across the city’s coastal zone, large backyard apartments can be built directly next to a neighboring property with no setback or buffer zone — even though the City Council outlawed doing so more than two years ago. —David Garrick, San Diego Union-Tribune, 5 May 2024

At the local government’s request, the University of Colorado Boulder developed a sustainable solid waste management plan in 2019 for the national park and buffer zone. —Alton C. Byers, The Conversation, 1 May 2024

Last year, the state legislature passed a law creating a 25-foot buffer zone between police and civilians. —Kristine Phillips, The Indianapolis Star, 27 Feb. 2024

The plan also says that Israel will seek to retain control over a sliver of land inside Gaza, along the Israeli border, where its military is systematically demolishing thousands of buildings in order to create another buffer zone. —Thomas Fuller, New York Times, 23 Feb. 2024

Putin also raised the prospect of taking Ukraine’s Kharkiv region as a buffer zone between Russia. —TIME, 18 Mar. 2024

California Forever said the new community would be 4.5 miles from the base with a security buffer zone where there would be nothing other than agriculture and solar farms. —Melody Gutierrez, Los Angeles Times, 9 Mar. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1908, in the meaning defined above

Legal Definition

buffer zone

noun

: an area designed to separate: as

a

: an area with certain boundaries beyond which protestors may not pass

b

: an area separating land used for different purposes

a buffer zone between the development and the park