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📸 Credit: St. Charles Business Alliance presentation
The St. Charles Business Alliance says downtown St. Charles continues to see strong foot traffic, steady hotel performance, and packed event calendars — and it wants to build on that momentum heading into 2026.
During its annual presentation to city officials, the Alliance highlighted visitor data, event attendance, and marketing efforts that helped drive activity downtown and across the city. At the same time, leaders laid out plans to expand programming and strengthen bike and pedestrian access as part of their next phase of work.
Here’s what to know:
Crowds and consistency: Unwind Wednesday events average about 1,000 attendees per night, and the Alliance plans to expand the series from three to six dates to create more reliable midweek traffic downtown.
Hotel performance: City data shared during the presentation showed local hotels averaging roughly 63.1% occupancy in 2025, with an average daily room rate around $168 — numbers officials tied in part to event-driven tourism and corporate travel.
Visitor tracking tools: The Alliance continues to use visitor analytics that allow it to track foot traffic patterns dating back to 2017, including peak days, dwell times, and where visitors are coming from. Visitors to downtown St. Charles increased to 3.6M in 2025 from 3.5M in 2024.
Broader accessibility push: Plans for 2026 include expanded bike maps, improved navigational signage, and placemaking efforts aimed at making downtown easier to explore and more inviting for both residents and visitors.
To support those efforts, the Alliance is requesting about $850K in funding for FY 2026–2027 along with a proposed four-year agreement.
City officials are expected to vote on the full budget in April.
Watch the full St. Charles Business Alliance presentation in this Feb. 17 Committee Of the Whole meeting recording.
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