Question: What do you get when you make Peachtree Street off-limits to cars and add thousands of pedestrians, bicyclists, skateboarders, roller-skaters, hover-boarders, musicians, stationary revelers, artists, dogs, and every other manner of Atlantan on a pristine September day?
Answer: 2.8 miles of good vibes.
After a long four-year hiatus, the city’s signature open-streets program, Atlanta Streets Alive, made a lively return Sunday, consuming Peachtree’s traffic lanes and sidewalks from south of Underground Atlanta up to 15th Street in Midtown.
Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta
The Peachtree route was among the most attended and frequently staged of the events over the years, with crowds often topping 100,000, as estimated by volunteer counters.
Atlanta Bicycle Coalition (now Propel ATL) originated Streets Alive, inspired by ciclovía events in Bogotá, Colombia and other cities. The Atlanta phenomenon began meagerly one day in 2010 when a stretch of Edgewood Avenue opened to bicyclists, skaters, walkers, and anyone else not driving a car.
Over the course of a decade, organizers say Streets Alive staged 29 events and covered some 83 miles of city streets, drawing an estimated 1.7 million people total.
The final pre-hiatus event was also held on Peachtree in 2019, before going dormant through pandemic years as logistics for a more frequent Streets Alive were worked out with the Atlanta Department of Transportation and other city leaders.
Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta
Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta
In the gallery above, find more than 80 photos cataloguing Sunday’s action along the entire route.
And mark your calendars: Streets Alive will return for two more Sunday installments this year—from 1 to 5 p.m. on Oct. 22 and Nov. 12.
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