... which refers to the directory above the document root.
Do you need the actual path? If you're doing some sort of file IO operation, then that path should resolve just fine. If you actually want to display the path (e.g. for the user's benefit), then you could use something like [man]realpath/man to resolve the '../' bit.
EDIT: You could also use [man]dirname/man on $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] itself, assuming that an ending '/' isn't present.
