Open Streets Is Coming Back! But Why Does It Have to Go?

Center City District’s Open Streets Walnut West is coming back, and Sandy Smith says it should keep on running into the fall. / Photograph courtesy of Center City District

Spring is sprung
The grass is riz
And Walnut West will be where Open Streets is.

But only for four glorious Sundays in April.

The Center City District’s pedestrian takeover of Rittenhouse Row returns for a third go-round starting April 6th. Every Sunday from then through April 27th, walkers will enjoy the freedom of the city as Center City’s toniest shopping street goes car-free from Broad to 19th streets along with 18th Street from Chestnut to Locust.

As before, retailers along these streets will extend their stores out into the roadway. The restaurants and bars will also set up tables and grills in the street. Shoppers and strollers alike will also enjoy acoustic music, dancers and an appearance by the Easter Bunny on the 20th.

The first of these carless Sundays took place last September, when the CCD launched its first four-week experiment. Then, it closed off Walnut again for two Sundays during the holiday shopping season.

The merchants and restaurateurs loved Open Streets as much as the shoppers. According to the CCD, nearly 90 percent of businesses reported increased foot traffic to their storefronts during that first fall event. Among the businesses that responded to the district’s survey, the average increase in foot traffic was 86 percent, but some reported as much as three times as much traffic as on a typical Sunday.

During the two-week December run, nearly 70 percent of merchants surveyed by the CCD reported increases in foot traffic, and more than half of them reported increased sales averaging 24 percent.

Open Streets Walnut West / Photograph by Laura Swartz

Clearly, the CCD is on to something with this idea, and they know it.

“From the moment we closed the street on that first Open Streets Sunday, it was clear that we had created something special,” Prema Katari Gupta, president and CEO of CCD, said in a press release announcing this third edition. “In addition to driving pedestrian traffic, visibility and sales to retailers and restaurants, our goal was to prove that streets filled with people drive more business than streets filled with cars.”

Seems to me that they’ve achieved their goal. And again, the CCD agrees: “We want to continue to provide a space for people to gather while simultaneously supporting businesses within our district,” Gupta continues. “Open Streets has been a wonderful addition to the Center City experience, and we hope to welcome even more visitors and residents this spring.”

And that raises an interesting question, at least to me: So why stop after just four weeks?

Events like this one, the Rittenhouse Row Spring Festival that will follow on the first Saturday in May and the Rittenhouse Square Fine Art Shows in June and September demonstrate that Philadelphians have a huge appetite for shopping and dining al fresco. And given how these outdoor events boost local businesses, it would seem that both the Rittenhouse Row merchants and the CCD would want to feed it as much as they can.

That argues for making Open Streets a regular affair from spring through fall as well as at the holiday shopping season. Just as the closing of Martin Luther King Drive to cars on weekends from the end of March through the end of October, another pilot project whose success led to expansion, lets fresh-air fiends and outdoor-activity buffs enjoy Fairmount Park in a way they can’t at other times, so making Open Streets a longer-lasting affair will both raise our spirits and fatten merchants’ bottom lines.

Open Streets is a win-win-win-win for residents, visitors, merchants and the city. Making it a regular part of everyday (or at least every Sunday) life in Philly should be a no-brainer.