Sure, downtown streets provide a place for cars to get from point A to B, but when you zoom by in your car, you don’t experience downtown or other neighborhoods. Open Streets Columbus aims to change all that, and they recently had an event where you could actually play in the street. How cool is that?



Neighbors joined friends and soon to be friends on Fourth Street between Main and Broad Streets for recreational activities like shuffleboard, four-square, juggling and much more. (Did anyone see the pizza slice pedaling by on the bike?) Whether people cruised by on bikes or skateboard, or they just strolled by on foot, they went at their own pace and met smack dab in the middle of the street.

Open Streets Columbus provided a fun and free way for everyone to enjoy the streets through a whole new perspective—a human-pace perspective.  By removing speeding cars, people of all ages and abilities got to know each other, had some fun and created a vibrant city-street experience. People traffic replaced car traffic, and Fourth Street became an urban playground for people to come out and improve their mental, physical and emotional health.

Just who organized this shindig? Open Streets Columbus is made up of a group of Columbus residents who want to create streets that serve all people whether using their feet, bikes, scooters or transit to move around. At one time, streets were a place for people to gather, and Open Streets Columbus wants to show that streets can be both pathways to get you to your destination as well as BEING a destination.

If you missed it this year, no worries. This initiative is part of an international Open Streets movement so there will be more opportunities to create a memorable downtown experiences. Find out more about the the initiative here. Follow the event happenings on Facebook, join the conversation on Twitter @openstreets614, and check out their photos on Instagram #openstreets614.

Let’s roll or walk or scoot.