By Gus Saltonstall
Open Streets season has returned to New York City and the Upper West Side.
On Thursday, the city’s Department of Transportation announced the official launch of the Open Streets program in 2026, with more than 150 initial locations throughout the five boroughs.
“Open Streets provide an opportunity to showcase neighborhoods and strengthen local businesses by transforming roadways into spaces that encourage connection and community engagement,” said NYC DOT Commissioner Mike Flynn, in a news release.
Open Streets is a collection of blocks that become restricted to cars, instead prioritizing pedestrians, bikers, outdoor dining, and other activities and events. The program began during the COVID-19 pandemic, in an effort to help with social distancing and give people better options for outdoor activities.
Here are the initial Upper West Side Open Streets locations for this year, which will run through the fall. These do not include street closures connected to recess at certain neighborhood schools.
Upper West Side Open Streets Locations
Amsterdam Avenue Open Streets
- Location: West 106th to 110th streets, along Amsterdam Avenue
- Schedule: Full closure on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
- Organizing Partner: The Columbus Amsterdam Business Improvement District
Amsterdam Avenue Open Streets #2
- Location: West 111th Street to Cathedral Parkway
- Schedule: Full closure on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
- Organizing Partner: The West 111th Street Block Association
Columbus Avenue Open Streets
- Location: West 68th to 77th streets
- Schedule: Full closure on Sundays from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (May 10 to July 26)
- Organizing Partner: The Columbus Avenue Business Improvement District
You can find out more about the Open Streets program and other locations throughout the city — HERE.
Subscribe to West Side Rag’s FREE email newsletter here. And you can Support the Rag here.
So same as last year.
Ok.
Open Streets is such a terrible program. The streets are never used and sit empty. There are no citizens sitting outside. There are no children playing. All deliveries and drivers and taxis are disrupted. Cancel it.
This is a shameful lie and a ridiculous comment. Allow me to enlighten you: Open Streets has fantastic turnout. We need to expand this program to even more streets and run it even more often.
The NYC DOT used actual sales tax data and found Open Streets corridors ran 19% above pre-pandemic sales baselines, while comparable streets without Open Streets were 29% below. The NY State Comptroller found the program supported the recovery of over 67,000 jobs. Restaurants on open streets reported 54% more customers, 45% more revenue, and 45% more staff.
New Yorkers do not want to sit inside like a hermit. When you give them car-free space to do it, they show up and they spend money. That is not empty streets. That is a city that works.
YIMBYs and urbanists think that they are more enlightened than everyone else and it is this arrogance that destroys support even further for your “livable” cities.
UWSYIMBY,
No mention of the impact on essential mass transit buses?
Aren’t folks entitled to full mass transit bus access and service?
You should know, as your username suggests, that there are, in fact, 2 subway lines on the UWS!
Your comment, just like the top level comment, is in bad faith and won’t be replied to by me moving forward.
The issue is that some people cannot take the subway.
Moreover, IMO people are entitled to full mass transit services and access.
And that buses should be prioritized over brunch.
It is also problematic IMO for the discussion to be framed as “no cars” and “good for business” – but no acknowledgment of the bus transit issue.
In any event, free speech is still possible – despite DT’s efforts – and differing opinions may be expressed. And without denigrating others
I can only think your bitterness over a lovely and time-limited UWS tradition that you may find personally inconvenient stems from elsewhere.
I make a deal with you. Have the Columbus open street but get rid of the street fairs on Broadway and Amsterdam since it’s clearview festival productions and Mardi Gras festivals running the same exact street fairs across the whole cities and waste of time and money.
There are, in fact, 2 parks on the UWS that your kids can play in, and there is absolutely nothing stopping any New Yorker from having brunch or shopping (spending money) in their own neighborhoods, while keeping the buses on schedule!
Weird you think that because I go to the Columbus Ave Open Street nearly every week and it’s quite well attended. Just last week my kids were playing with like 6 other neighborhood kids and there were like another 15 people enjoying the chairs / tables in the street in front of Muffins.
You should leave your apartment once in a while, open streets was bustling the past two weekends
These are not “Open Streets”. They are “Closed Streets”. Completely unnecessary in a neighborhood bordered by two parks and with other green spaces throughout.
” transforming roadways into spaces that encourage connection and community engagement,” Where do they come up with this nonsense?
Not to mention, it’s the same group of people who continue to tell anyone that doesn’t like their ‘improvements,’ that we should move to the suburbs. You know, the suburbs where you have your own back yard that encourages community engagement. 🙄
Bill- I think I can help explain. They call them Open Streets because they “open up” the streets for pedestrians to use instead of just cars. I like playing with my kids outside on Sundays in the summer, so these are a nice activity for us.
“Just cars?” How about buses, fire engines, ambulances?
If your kids really prefer playing on a hot, dirty asphalt street rather than our great parks and playgrounds, why not promote open streets on side streets, like the one on 111th Street, rather than busy avenues?
why not go to the numerous parks or playgrounds in the neighborhood
Why not go to the numerous other streets in the neighborhood?
Pretty sure it is being pushed by taxi drivers union. Closed streets = longer taxi rides = higher fares.
“ 19 pandemic, in an effort to help with social distancing and give people better options for outdoor activities.”
And now? What is its purpose? To keep UWS Dad and the rest of TransAlt entitled crowd happy at the expense of the others?
Obviously it’s just enjoyable to stroll the neighborhood without the noise and pollution from cars, and while it does keep me happy, I would guess the Columbus Ave BID recognizes it’s good for local businesses
Open Streets also has “programs” of
unbearably loud live and recorded music that makes reading, work, and listening to our own music impossible within our apartments.
I, too, am deeply unsettled byt he sound of other people enjoying themselves. I moved to New York for peace and quiet and solitude.
Like going to Casablanca for the waters, amirite?
I came to NYC for the wonderful diversity and the energy abounding everywhere. I’ve never been disappointed. I find that changing my attitude from that of the small-hearted Grinch (“oh, the noise!”) to that of the large-hearted Grinch (“What joy there is in that sound!”) makes me a lot happier. (And humor, like that of the oppositionally-named Curmudgeon, helps a lot.)
Fine, if that’s the sound you hear in your neighborhood, Visit the blocks north of 106th St.. If it were not open streets, they would not be allowed to play music at that volume. It’s not people noise.
A big waste of time.
Let the whining begin
The 72nd Street Whine Clinic is offering free whine therapy sessions during this week’s open streets.
The Columbus open street should at least go until August!
TERRIBLE PROGRAM.: loud music disturbing neighbors on a Sunday morning/afternoon, children in the street with bikes coming through, terrible for local businesses [with the exception of restaurants who expand even further into public space], and dear seniors who cannot take the bus route down Columbus Ave.
I’ve lived in this neighborhood for 4 decades. What was once a wonderful clean district is in total decline. Who’S to blame? I can think of a few! Vote smart people and not for the same politicians over and over again!
Always funny to me when people who think an event put on by the BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT is terrible for local businesses
GREAT PROGRAM.: Great tunes, neighbors having fun and socializing. I’ve lived in the neighborhood for 5 decades. What was once a hood filled with wild, crazy, partying 20 somethings has evolved into a great family area. Keep voting well!
omg you people are miserable!! It’s a nice opportunity to walk around the neighborhood and patronize local businesses. If you’re so worried about taxi fares take the subway like a noraml person! I swear half of you whine in this comment section just to hear your own voices
Fair enough but it is not fair to people who can’t get to tht to the subway. I had fun when there was Open Streets close to me. But it really isn’t fair to bus riders, and the effect on ambulances always made me uncomfortable. It is one thing if it is easy to walk a few blocks to catch the train, it is another when walking is difficult.
If you can’t walk to the subway or the rerouted bus, you definitely can’t walk all the way to Riverside or Central Parks. Open Streets is really your only opportunity all year to be outside and get some fresh air.
And you’re not commenting to hear your own voice?
That’s what comments are for, to express personal opinions.
Serious question: What’s keeping you from walking around the neighborhood and patronizing local businesses without inconveniencing your neighbors who need the Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue buses for reasons of age and/or mobility? I assure you, it’s a perfectly nice experience without the fake “community-building” of Open Streets.
Open streets is one of the best things about the UWS!
1. Mass transit is supposed to be NYC’s priority.
Not understanding how there is any justification to close bus route streets at all – and especially a street that is a block from Central Park.
Not ok to prioritize brunch over essential mass transit.
(And absurd to tout bus lanes and then no buses)
2. There is an unfair benefit to restaurants – only restaurants situated in this area benefit.
(And most are restaurant groups/LLCs – not “mom & pop” independents)
If the point is to help restaurants and shops, then a tax break for all would be equitable
Open Streets so close to two hospitals seems like such a bad idea. Yes ambulances can go through, bit it does take more time
And the bus detours for the M7 and M11?
These are fun but I think maybe not quite so close to the hospitals or on an avenue for buses.
Some of the folks who populate the comments of this paper are truly some of the most miserable people I’ve ever encountered.
Open Streets is one of the absolute best activities to take part in, or simply stroll through on a beautiful summer day.
I feel bad for the folks in the comment section. We are privileged to live in an absolutely amazing and beautiful kaleidoscope of culture, and Open Streets helps us all appreciate this fact. Yet your hearts have shriveled into unrecognizable little husks.
“streets that are closed year-round to vehicle traffic, such as West 103rd Street, from Riverside Drive to Broadway.”
The two blocks mentioned here are open to vehicular traffic year-round, which is fine. It’s a street, it should be used as such. The only peculiarity with 103rd Street is that it is littered with those idiotic boulders, from Amsterdam to RSD. Placed in painted areas of the pavement with the aesthetics of a preschool playground, where the paint job looked like crap after two days anyway. It took away probably a dozen parking spots too. I don’t have a car but many of my neighbors do, as so many who work in the area. It’s one man’s eyesore of a vanity project that serves no purpose other than to act as a trash magnet for the buildings on those blocks when they put out their garbage at night. Get rid of the rocks.