Reimagining the French Quarter
The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a unique opportunity to explore creative, pedestrian-centric approaches that have the potential to draw both locals and tourists to sustain the French Quarter in a healthy and vibrant way.
The City of New Orleans is in the process of developing seven concepts aimed at achieving the following goals:
- Offer a safe, accessible and comfortable environment for residents and visitors to enjoy;
- Improve the overall quality of life with sustainable near- and long-term pedestrian-centric approaches.;
- Provide creative opportunities that support the full business ecosystem to reopen, recover and thrive as we move through and beyond COVID19 restrictions; and
- Establish an inclusive framework and processes for decision-making that ensures pedestrianization efforts support improved outcomes for all stakeholders.
Review Initial Concepts
French Market Place Design Charette
Monday, November 16, 2020
The City hosted a virtual design charette regarding the French Market Place concept on November 16th at 6 PM.
(View the PDF presentation)
(View the meeting recording) Password: KpmM2Wsd
Whether you were able to attend the November 16th charette or not, we invite you to provide feedback via the options below:
***Comments and survey responses for this concept were accepted through Tuesday, December 8th.***
Slow Quarter Design Charette
Monday, March 8, 2021
The City hosted a virtual design charette regarding the Slow Quarter concept on March 8th at 6 PM.
(View the PDF presentation)
(View the meeting recording)
Whether you were able to attend the March 8th charette or not, we invite you to provide feedback via the options below:
***Comments and survey responses for this concept will be accepted through Monday, April 26th.***
Curbside Dining Short-Term Pilot Program
Based on best-practices nationwide, and the urgency of supporting businesses while balancing public health imperatives during COVID, the City is developing a short-term pilot Curbside Dining initiative that will be implemented on a geographically diverse set of small business corridors in communities across New Orleans and centered around the following goals:
- Supporting New Orleans businesses during the COVID pandemic by providing additional space to safely conduct their business
- Providing safe and comfortable social spaces in the public right of way
- Activating New Orleans streets and engage in placemaking by enabling unique community-created spaces to extend into the street
- Encouraging walking, biking, and use of transit
During the pilot, the City will designate five to seven corridors as pilot Curbside Dining locations. In each corridor, the City will place physical barriers and bag the municipal parking meters to create curbside dining areas. Restaurants in the pilot corridors will be allowed to expand their operations into the curbside dining area directly adjacent to their place of business.
Due to the need to monitor the effectiveness of the program, the pilot will be rolled out in a limited number of commercial corridors according to a set of criteria designed to equitably and efficiently support as many businesses as possible during the COVID crisis.
The cost to the City is paying for barriers, manpower for placing and monitoring the barriers and curbside dining locations, and the foregone on-street parking meter revenues.
The approximately 30-day pilot is anticipated to begin in summer 2020.
Streateries Pilot
In addition to the Curbside Dining pilot, the City will also identify three to five streets that can be fully closed to traffic as a “Streateries” pilot. The Streateries pilot will operate largely the same as the Curbside Dining pilot, following similar criteria, implementation schedule, and timeline. The major difference between the two pilots will be that Curbside Dining is limited to the parking spaces on a corridor, whereas Streateries are eligible to close off the entire public right-of-way to vehicular traffic to be utilized for business activities, and for patrons to properly social distance.
The approximately 30-day pilot is anticipated to begin in summer 2020.
Curbside Dining and Parklets Long-Term Proposal
While the Curbside Dining pilot moves forward, the City is simultaneously developing a permanent Parklet or Curbside Dining system to which any business may apply.
The Parklet and Curbside Dining program should build upon or borrow elements from already existing permits and programs, such as the Sidewalk Café permit, the Municipal Parking Meter permit, and the food truck permitting structure. The program should not rely on concession agreements.
Opportunities for Engagement
The City will ensure that an inclusive and transparent co-design process is at the foundation of the French Quarter Pedestrianization Work. Currently, the City is working with an external group of French Quarter leaders on the initial concepts. As part of this phase, a survey was conducted to gather data about how people use the French Quarter, top concerns, pedestrianization approaches, etc. The City is in the process of analyzing the results of the survey; that analysis will be public and shared broadly. View the summary results here.
The City plans to host a series of co-design charettes, the first of which was held on November 1th. During these charrettes we will work with stakeholders to ensure that any final designs meet the needs of the users. Information regarding dates and times for co-design charettes will be posted on this page and nola.gov/neoevents.