go down the road?
 

to be or not to be

Re: go down the road?
 

No - contrary to what you were told (perhaps you misunderstood?), if there's a hill involved, then up or down will usually be used literally. My house is on a very slight hill, and I would always say Go up the road if the person had to climb the hill and Go down the road if they were going in the other direction.

In the case of a horizontal road, the choice will usually be purely random - there'll be no difference in meaning between Go up/down the road - but it does sometimes depend on direction. I might talk about driving up the M1 if I'm going north and down the M1 if I'm going south. Or up may be used meaning towards the centre or an important place. From my house in the suburbs of London I'd talk about going up to town meaning to the centre of London. But that, though widespread, may be ultimately idiosyncratic or regionally based. Americans talk about going "downtown" when they go to the centre.

Re: go down the road?
 

maybe I misunderstood him

thanks a lot!

Re: go down the road?
 

I have one independent question that has nothing to do with the topic of this thread. Why is it not said " Today a foreigner asked me for THE/A road direction."?
How can an article be omitted if 'direction' is a countable noun?

Thanks

Re: go down the road?
 

The correct expression is : Today, someone asked me for directions.

Re: go down the road?
 

sorry for the mistake. When I was thinking the word direction, I remembered that the word can function as an uncountable noun.

thank you for your correction Susan.