Why Not Close Santa Fe Drive to Traffic for Every First Friday Art Walk?

The Art District on Santa Fe's First Friday Art Walk event has been experiencing some growing pains.

Last year, officials from the Denver Department of Infrastructure & Transportation started telling vendors setting up along Santa Fe Drive during the eclectic monthly event that they would have to move off the main street because of accessibility and safety concerns, as well as some issues with blocking entrances to businesses. Ouch.

This year, the groans from those growing pains became audible when the Art District on Santa Fe got First Friday permitted by the city as a Special Event, meaning that artists hoping to sell their wares were no longer allowed to set up along Santa Fe at all. And while vending had previously been free, now they'd have to pay for a spot along one of the art district's side streets, where portions of Seventh, Ninth and Tenth avenues were closed to traffic. Ouch again.

As a result of that permitting, vendors seemed decidedly separate from the galleries at the May First Friday, when the two used to make up one fluid and organic event.
While pedestrians didn't have to navigate around vendors on crowded sidewalks along Santa Fe Drive, they still had to deal with the crush of vehicular traffic making its way down the street.

And that's the real pain on First Friday. If Denver really valued a historical, community-driven arts event that only happens for a few hours once a month, Santa Fe Drive would be closed to traffic — not to vendors — during the First Fridays on the warm nights May through September.

Picture this: Two rows of vendor booths in the middle of the street facing away from each other and toward the businesses on each side, creating passages for pedestrians to walk through as they visit both galleries and vendor booths. Every artist (whether their work is hanging in a gallery or set up DIY-style on the street) has an equal opportunity to grab attention. And no one needs to worry about getting hit by a car.

On the flip side, drivers don't have to worry about navigating dark streets full of slow-moving pedestrians, either. And drivers could plan ahead for alternate routes or take public transportation.

But this is just a daydream about a world that doesn't prioritize vehicle transportation over community and art. "Although we would love to implement full closures of Santa Fe Drive every month, the city will not permit them more than once per year due to the heavy amount of traffic that moves down Santa Fe Drive," says ADSF director of programs and operations Ana Paula Pinto.

Even if the city did allow it, it would be prohibitively expensive for the district. "A full closure of Santa Fe Drive can cost up to $30,000 per event (between permits, barricades, security, EMS, additional staff hours, etc.), which far exceeds ADSF's budget as a small nonprofit," Pinto notes.
According to DOTI's Nancy Kuhn, the reason the city is reluctant to close more First Friday events to traffic is because Santa Fe is a popular route for people to take into downtown, especially on a Friday night. "Once you get to Sixth Avenue, alternative routes adjacent to Santa Fe are limited and people traveling north on Santa Fe must take Sixth Avenue eastbound to the next major corridor at the intersection of Speer/Lincoln/Broadway," Kuhn says.

She adds that there aren't many adjacent parallel streets that can accommodate the high volume of vehicles that Santa Fe carries, as was evident during the August 2024 First Friday, when Santa Fe was closed. "Last year's closure led to cut-through traffic through the adjacent neighborhoods, which we have asked the event organizers to address this year with additional signage on the side streets to discourage cut-through traffic," Kuhn says.

Even so, Kuhn confirms that ADSF's traffic control plan for closing Santa Fe Drive on August 1 this year has been approved from 3 p.m. to 11:59 p.m. "I think the event is almost done submitting the various paperwork it needs for a completed application," Kuhn says. "Once that submittal is complete, we will release the permit."

However, Pinto says ADSF's requests to shut down the street a few hours earlier for a safer setup time were denied. "We were almost not given the green light to host the event at all, so we don't anticipate permission for additional closures anytime soon," she adds.

"It's possible that a big push from the community could convince the city to close down Santa Fe Drive at least a few more times a year," Pinto says. "There are other events that have set such a precedent ...However, with the pushback we've received, it seems unlikely." 

In the meantime, ADSF has been taking feedback from the community about the changes to First Friday to heart. "We want our community to rest assured that ADSF is working hard to meet the needs of our visitors, creative businesses, vendors and the city all at once, so we ask for patience and collaboration as we figure out a system that allows us to keep our sidewalks safe and ADA compliant, our creative businesses accessible and our vendors happy and successful while adhering to City requirements," Pinto says.

She adds that the art district is also currently looking for vendor sponsorships for First Friday so that vendor registration can be free for local artists. "The idea is for sponsors to support one or more of our vendor areas to ease the burden of permitting/avenue closure costs so that we don't have to charge vendors to participate. Interested sponsors can email me at [email protected] to learn more," she says.