Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) Wall Street, New York City.

[1612		E. Eden (trans.) of Martyr First Books on America (Arber) 186: Common places whyther marchauntes resort as to the burse or streate [F&H]].
1862		R. Kimball Undercurrents of Wall Street 178: Sufficient of the two millions [could be] launched on the street .
1870		J.K. Medbery Men and Mysteries of Wall Street 159: Drew, Vanderbilt, Fisk, Jerome, Jacob Little, all the heroes who still breathe vital breath, [...] have never failed to be unpopular on ‘the street.’.
1883		Nation 16 Aug. 132/1: ‘The Street’ begins to play a larger and larger part in the financial world, owing to the enormous amounts of American capital it holds and of foreign capital it distributes [DA].
1903		‘Hugh McHugh’ Out for the Coin 14: He grabbed his lid, shook a day-to-day to the Street, and dipped for the woods.
1906		S. Ford Shorty McCabe 91: [...] somethin’ breaks loose down on the street that makes him forget everything but the figures on the tape.
1928		R. Lardner ‘Dinner’ in Coll. Short Stories (1941) 143: Oh, are you in the Street? That’s what they call Wall Street, isn’t it?
1964		E. Wilson Earl Wilson’s New York 22: So we leave ‘The Street,’ as the knowing call Wall.
1993		(ref. to 20C+) I.L. Allen City in Sl. (1995) 39: The Street also is a nickname for sections of New York with a concentration of certain high-flying professions or trades, especially of entertainment, advertising, or finance, which can be jungle-like. Those several Manhattan street names that became metonyms for their most important businesses— Wall Street, Madison Avenue, Broadway, 52nd Street—have been called The Street by insiders.
2006		G. Malkani Londonstani (2007) 212: I work on the Street. Trade futures.

2. (US) Madison Avenue, New York City.

1993

(ref. to 20C+) see sense 1.

3. Fleet Street, London EC, until 1990s home to the main newspaper offices.

1927

E. Wallace Squeaker (1950) 28: There isn’t a man on The Street to whom you couldn’t give three weeks start.

4. (US) Broadway, New York City.

1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
1993		(ref. to 1900s–10s) I.L. Allen City in Sl. (1995) 39: The Broadway theater district was called The Street in its glamour days early in this century.

5. (US) 52nd Street, between 5th and 6th Avenues, then the centre of New York City jazz clubs.

1993

(ref. to 1930s–40s) I.L. Allen City in Sl. (1995) 39: In the late 1930s and 1940s, the two-block stretch of 52nd Street, especially between Fifth and Sixth avenues, and beyond the El at Sixth, toward Seventh Avenue, was famous for its jazz clubs and was called The Street by jazzmen, taxi drivers, and other hep sorts.