word usage - Closeness and “alongside”


When describing the relative position of two line segments, one might use the word alongside to communicate that the line segments are close together and run parallel to one another.


I'm trying to determine how close two line segments need to be in order for alongside to be a reasonable description of their relative position.


For example, if a 13 foot section of gas line runs parallel to a 13 foot long wall of a house, how close would the two need to be in order for the statement “the gas line runs alongside the wall” to be accurate?


If the distance between the two segments is significantly less than the distance between the beginning and end of each segment, could they be considered to be close enough that they run alongside one another? For example, if the gas line in the above example lies 7 feet from the wall, would it be reasonable to say that it runs alongside the wall?




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