Lovely, and very handy if your car happens to drip a bit of oil as easier to replace a bit of turf ;-)

I live in Michigan and see these in lower income neighborhoods and they are kept up very poorly. I would never have thought of using them as a design element! The pictures above are beautiful and something that I would consider if I had to repave my driveway for sure.

A few years ago, I heard of a plan to replace paved alleys with ribbon alleys, a variation of the ribbon driveway, but I don't know if the plan progressed past the planning stage. I think they're lovely, and yes something to reduce rainfall runoff is a good idea.

I love these types of driveways. Much prettier than the traditional.

My grandmother in Shreveport has one of these. It is lovely, but it is REALLY DIFFICULT to back out of her driveway! Mostly because it is so long, and curves behind the house.

My house growing up in rochester ny had a driveway like this. The end closest to the street had been paved, and that's where my parents parked their tiny car. The rest of the driveway led back to the garage, which we only used for storage, so my dad turned the grass ribbons in the middle and on either side of the driveway into plant beds and used the concrete ribbons as paths between sections of the garden.

these types of drive ways make so much more sense. I suppose that in the snow belt this could be a bit of a problem, especially with a steepish grade. I can imagine tires spinning and ultimately digging a nice gouge through that turf. But with a little care this is so much nicer than a great load of asphalt.

So much nicer than a blank slab of concrete...
...or worse: Asphalt.

Are those quail behind the sparrow? Very cute little birds.

If you have not read "My Quail Robert" you should. It is charming. =)

I love this idea, and I'm especially attracted to how it helps prevent a lot of sewer runoff. I have even heard of all-grass driveways that use really sturdy turf that can stand up to traffic.

The house I grew up in had a ribbon driveway. The only downside: we had a basketball hoop attached to the garage, and we couldn't play a regular basketball game because of the grass, only HORSE.

Also, I love sehunter's post. A garden down the strip sounds like a great idea if one doesn't own a car or drive down the length of the driveway.

My 1920's house has one, but the center strip is just gravel right now. I've been thinking of planting it with a succlent groundcover like hens and chicks. It doesn't really need to be able to stand up to traffic, right, since it's in the middle, not under the tires?

My dad remodeled our house when I was a kid and added this kind of driveway. He actually bricked the driveway part himself, so it was extra pretty to see the grass between the strips of brick.

My in-laws in Detroit had a driveway like this. It was cool looking, but so narrow that while I was trying to avoid the outdoor spigot on the side of the house I managed to hit the fire hydrant at the end of the driveway. And the little stoop you see so close to the drive? My MIL used to hit it regularly.

Our city requires impermiable surfaces for driveways, so I don't know that it would fly here. I think they don't want car fluids getting into the soil in people's yards. The ribbon does look a lot nicer than a large expanse of asphalt.

Adorable quails!

I always felt like I was crazy for loving these - we have a small historic area and the ribbon driveways are one of my favorite elements.

And thank you so much for naming them!

When I was very young we had that type of single car driveway before my parents went all high class on us and made a 2 car black top one.

I never knew these were called Ribbon Driveways. Love it.

Learned something new!

The name 'ribbon driveways' must have gone the way of a few other words such as 'davenport' - don't hear that much anymore either.

My house is a duplex built in 1950 and has a "ribbon" (more of a very long oval) between my drive and the one next door. The drives are very narrow, and one of us is forever managing to drive over the edge of it and make a huge mess. It's not easy to keep it in good shape, though it's a pleasant idea.

They are called "Hollywood Driveways" out here in California.

My neighbor just had one installed this week. I had no idea what they were called until now.

We have a ribbon driveway and it has it's pluses and minuses. Unfortunately we live in the snow belt and salt run-off from our cars tends to kill the grass in the spots we park our car. It's difficult to get new grass to grow without replacing the soil first. As some have mentioned it can be difficult backing out. If a wheel gets off track when the ground is soft, as during the spring thaw, you leave a nice rut in the sod. And it can be a pain if you have more than one car. By some twisted law of chance it seems my car always has another parked behind it when I need to go somewhere. Did I say there were pluses?

We have a ribbon driveway and it is one of my favorite things about my yard. Our garage is connected at the rear of our house, so the driveway would be SUCH a mass of concrete without the grass to break it up. We live in Utah and get TONS of snow in the winter and have never had trouble with shoveling. I'm a pretty lousy driver, too, and back up over the grass at least once a week but it always seems to recover :)

I have one of these at my house. As we only ever park at the start of the drive (too hard to get the kids out next to the house) we pulled up all the grass and planted a fairly large vegie patch.

We were kept in vegies all summer and kept the neighbourhood entertained with the placement of our garden.

This strikes me as really bizarre because growing up I saw plenty of gravel country driveways where the strip of grass naturally grows in the middle, since the middle doesn't get driven on...nothing special. Quirky cityfolk imitation. ;)

Is there no non-plastic solution to reinforcing the grass part? I dunno, maybe some honeycomb made out of cement or stone or... ?

I'm a lousy backer-upper -- this would never work for me! Plus, there are definitely issues with chemical runoff from vehicles getting into the water table. (At least when it hits the sewage system it gets treated and filtered.)

Plus (as has been stated) the salt and other chemicals kill the pretty grass in northern climes. So it would not look like the example.

But mostly, in NH we have plow trucks clear the road and (asphalt) driveway in our "condo" complex -- and they would scoop the "median" up and leave it deposited in the middle of the lawn. Last winter we had six foot mountains of snow off to the sides of the driveway, and all that came from what would partly be grass in a ribbon driveway.

Pretty, but not practical. At least here.

Here in Northern California, our city codes prevent laying new ribbon driveways. My mother's home had one when she bought it, and she wanted to replace the broken concrete with bricks when she redid her porch and walkway. The contractor explained that while existing ribbon driveways were legal, new ones were not, as oil and other auto fluids can seep into the soil and contaminate the ground water. So, environmentally, it's kind of a wash.

I have one of these with gravel on top--so there are strips of concrete under the tires and plants growing up through the middle.

Shoveling is not usually such a big deal here in Maryland, but with our insane snow this past year, it was definitely a pain.

Our house has a bricked ribbon driveway (although I didn't know it had a name until now!). I like it! It meets our garage in our (small) backyard-it pretty much doubles the size of the yard. Right now, the tracks need to be treated for weeds, but it's still a really cool driveway-and even cooler when it's weed-free! And shoveling snow hasn't really been a problem-you just know to scrape the snow off the top of the ribbon and not gauge the shovel into the grass. No problem!

If you want a kinda in-between option, you can put in concrete blocks that leave space for grass to grow, like this (also called 'turf pavers'):

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/07/porous_pavingop.php

But if you're really trying to reduce stormwater runoff, then forget about grass and put in stone. Grass isn't the most environmentally friendly surface, high maintenance and not alot of infiltration. If you have to put in a concrete slab or asphalt, then use pervious concrete or asphalt like this:

http://www.perviouspavement.org/

@SherryBinNH: Where I live, the storm drains run right into the ocean (eventually) without the water being treated. There is an ongoing PSA campaign to inform people not to dump stuff into storm drains and be careful about what runs off their property.

I think it's generally accepted that permeable surfaces that allow rainwater to penetrate back into the ground are better than impermeable surfaces, but yeah letting motor oil and other contaminants get in there is not so great.

As far as keeping motor oil and antifreeze and other things from the water supply, ribbon driveways are probably no better than concrete slabs. But reducing the expanse of concrete, even a little bit, cools the earth and that IS a good thing.

Many municipalities encourage ribbon driveways (like prospect heights IL).

There must be a clever design solution to provide a barrier against car fluids in only the spot where one actually parks the car.
Anyone have any ideas?

I would recommend grasspave2, the plastic ring type grass reinforcement stuff. Once the grass grow in you can't even see it. It's extremely strong, I have used it for grass fire lanes, and also great lawns used for events where people walk and sit. The concrete type are never invisible because they are too thick. I think they also get too hot for the grass, at least here in Texas.
Use natives in these spots. They are hardier and don't require much water, if any. Buffalo grass would be a good choice.