Chapel Hill Police Department, Downtown Partnership Prepare for Halloween

The Chapel Hill Police Department is planning the yearly shut-down of Franklin Street for Homegrown Halloween, Chapel Hill’s Halloween celebration. CHPD starts planning for Halloween a year in advance.

“We really start planning each year for the next Halloween November first,” said Police Chief Chris Blue. “It’s a year round event as we consider what we learned the previous year and what we can apply.”

He says this year, Halloween is going to look a little bit different, especially since October 31 falls on a Monday. Because it’s an early weekday, Blue says the event will be earlier this year: 8:00 – 10:30 P.M.

“We found the last few years that announcing the closure and opening time helps people to plan their visit and it helps us when we begin trying to clear the street,” he said. “Folks know what to expect when we make some announcements in advance of that street clearing and it just works great.”

Also unlike previous years, police are keeping Columbia Street open, and are shifting the event from Spanky’s to the Morehead Planetarium. This is so vendors on Columbia and West Franklin Streets don’t have to lose business because of the pedestrian traffic.

Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership Executive Director Meg McGurk said the town had a meeting with vendors to ensure the new plan would work for everyone.

“Before any of us went public with it was first, ‘How do you feel about it? Is this going to work for you? What is your feedback?’” she said. “And we still had the ability to kind of adjust those plans if we heard overwhelmingly that this wasn’t going to work for them.”

McGurk also said many of these vendors will be selling Halloween costumes and props leading up to the event, but Blue said there will be a ban on costume pieces that look as if they could be used as a weapon. Other bans include flammables, pets and alcohol.

But overall, he said most of the attendees have been respectful of these bans, and of the event in the past.

“People have gotten really good about policing themselves with respect to what they bring to the event,” Blue said. “So we’re really pleased our messaging has worked so well along with the merchants, along with the university, the neighborhoods, we think it’s going just about as well as it can go for an event of that scale.”

Police are requesting that pedestrians enter the event via Rosemary Street or Cameron Avenue. For more information on Homegrown Halloween visit the town’s website here.