March 10, 2026
Kristin Hunt/for PhillyVoice
The Open Streets program, which closes select blocks in Center City to cars for a designated afternoon or evening, is returning with 20 new dates. It will run in the Rittenhouse and Gayborhood areas.
The Center City District is investing big in its Open Streets initiative with 20 car-free dates scheduled for 2026.
The program, which closes off select neighborhood blocks to vehicles, will return next month. On each Sunday in April, the section of Rittenhouse spanning Walnut Street between 19th and Broad streets and 18th Street between Chestnut and Locust streets will open up to pedestrians from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.. Those blocks will also go car-free the first three Sundays in May.
The initiative will move to the Gayborhood for each Tuesday in June, building on its findings there from last summer. The stretch of 13th Street from Chestnut to Walnut streets and Sansom Street from Juniper to 12th streets will be closed to traffic between 4-9 p.m. on those dates. Drury Street will also be part of the program.
Open Streets will then return to Rittenhouse each Sunday from Sept. 13 to Oct. 25, plus a single holiday date on Dec. 6.
Center City District said the initiative, which has run sporadically since 2024, has significantly boosted foot traffic and spending in the Rittenhouse area. Businesses on the designated blocks reported a 38% increase in average sales on Open Streets days compared with typical Sundays. Overall pedestrian activity also rose by 27%. The district recorded a cumulative 170,000 visitors over the course of the program, or an average 10,000 people per event.
This analysis did not, however, include the Open Streets pilot program in the Gayborhood. According to the district's latest report, running the initiative on Sunday afternoons "proved too early to capture the district’s typical customer activity and did not align with the rhythm of neighborhood use." That's why they've shifted to Tuesday evening hours this year, betting this time frame will align with "office worker schedules and peak dining demand."
"These findings reinforced an important principle: while the Open Streets framework is transferable, it is not static," the report reads. "Each corridor requires informed adjustments based on its cultural and economic landscape."
The district believes that Open Streets is scalable and could become more than a "seasonal novelty." It has called on the city to establish a permitting framework separate from street festivals and invest in modular, permanent and semi-permanent traffic barriers to support the program's growth.
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