Car-free weekends on Main Street begin this Friday in Salt Lake City 

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• Benjamin Wood
• The annual Open Streets on Main begins Friday, Sept. 15, in Salt Lake City.

DOWNTOWN—Salt Lake City's Main Street will swap the noise, exhaust and high speeds of weekend traffic for the pitter-patter of thousands of feet with the return of Open Streets, beginning Friday and running through October.

Each Friday and Saturday will see Main Street closed to cars between 400 South and South Temple, beginning at noon. Perpendicular streets will remain open to regular traffic. Many businesses—including bars and restaurants—will extend their operations onto the sidewalk and each weekend is scheduled with a range of entertainment programming, from a 9-hole urban golf course to weekly yoga at Gallivan and scores of street performers.

We are going to have some fun again on Main Street," Dee Brewer, executive director of the Downtown Alliance, said at a kickoff press event Thursday. "We believe that Main Street and Downtown are at their best when people are put first "

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• Benjamin Wood
• Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall speaks to reporters at a kickoff event for 2023's Open Streets on Main.

Mayor Erin Mendenhall credited the success of Open Streets—which launched during the COVID-19 pandemic—with boosting Salt Lake's downtown economic recovery, believed to be among the most successful in the nation. She reiterated her intention to permanently transform Main Street downtown into a pedestrian-focused promenade, noting that such plans have been on the books for roughly 60 years, when leaders at the time developed a "Second Century" plan for the city.

"With our doubling downtown population, we need spaces like this," Mendenhall said.

Earlier this year, the city launched a round of public engagement and surveys aimed at guiding a Main Street redesign. And Mendenhall said her administration is close to an early mock-up of what a pedestrianized corridor could include.

"We have come up with some preliminary designs that we’re excited to share immediately after Open Streets closes this fall," Mendenhall said.

This year's Open Streets comes on the heels of the Green Loop pop-up park on 200 East, a pilot demonstration of how Salt Lake City's ultra-wide and dangerous street grid could be reconfigured as beneficial public space. Those plans call for a loop of slow-speed streets with pocket parks and green landscaping circling the downtown core, and serving to connect many of the city's walking and cycling paths.

Mendenhall has also pushed the development of the Green Loop, and on Thursday said projects like it and Open Streets help to reimagine the use and practices around streets.

"Rather than impede east-west traffic, this promenade will make it easier, actually." Mendenhall said. "Downtown is open. So come down and check us out and have some fun every weekend through October."

In previous years, Open Streets ran during the summer season and in 2022, it was expanded to include Sunday brunch hours, when many non-culinary businesses on Main are closed. Brewer said that some businesses prospered under the extra hours, but there wasn't enough broad participation along the corridor to maintain a vibrant atmosphere.

"We need the critical mass," Brewer said, "and we’ve got that on Friday and Saturday."

Britney Helmers, director of The Blocks, said that organizers have worked with 50 new community partners to add to the programming during Open Streets. The initial COVID years largely stopped at opening up the asphalt for foot traffic, and extended sidewalk patios, but the 2023 iteration will include things like fire pits, performance stages, lounge areas with furniture and shipping container silent discos.

"There is something for everyone," Helmers said. "So we're really thinking about the urban playground—art, music, health and wellness—and really applying that to everywhere in downtown."

More information on Open Streets and the city's plans to reconfigure Main Street can be found at mainslc.com.