Economic Revitalization
Tracking downtown revitalization
Since the onset of COVID-19, DSA has been tracking the impact on our local economy. As downtown bounces back, we continue to follow dozens of metrics to trace the path to full economic recovery. A few of these metrics are below.
Downtown Revitalization Dashboard
October 2025 (September data)
Downtown Seattle was the first American urban center to experience the impacts of COVID-19, enduring a sudden economic downturn. As downtown continues to evolve, DSA will publish a monthly Revitalization Dashboard examining key metrics. The data sets provide a comparison point to the same time period in 2019. Additionally, the dashboard will feature notable stories that provide context regarding downtown’s renewal and reemergence.
Please credit the Downtown Seattle Association Revitalization Dashboard for use of charts, data and images on this page.
Unique monthly visitors compared to 2019
Nearly 3 million unique visitors came downtown in September 2025. This represents 105% of the visitors seen in September 2019 but a 5% decline from September 2024.
Average weekday worker foot traffic
In September, downtown’s worker foot traffic was 62% of September 2019’s daily average. Excluding the Labor Day holiday, this figure represents more than 147,000 daily worker visits.
Monthly hotel rooms sold compared to 2019
There were more than 380,000 downtown hotel rooms sold in September 2025. This figure represents 100% of the demand in September 2019, and a similar level of demand compared to September 2024.
Quarterly
In September, the number of occupied apartment units downtown continued growing, rising to nearly 60,700. This represents a 4% increase compared to Q3 2024 and a 20% increase compared to Q3 2019.
Of Note in Downtown
Violent crime incidents in Seattle police’s M sectors (the downtown core) declined 36% between June–August 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. This was the lowest number of incidents for the summer period since 2017.
According to CoStar, Q3 2025 was the first quarter since Q3 2021 where the net absorption rate was positive (i.e., more office space was leased than vacated) potentially indicating a start to the recovery in the office sector.
DSA member Lime is reporting Saturday, Sept. 27 was its busiest day yet in Seattle with 60,000 rides through downtown and across the city. Overall, there were 6.6 million trips in Seattle year-to-date through September, already topping 2024’s total of 5.9 million rides.
Coming Up in Downtown
The Seattle Convention Center Arch Building will welcome an expected 15,000 fans of the strange, unusual and bizarre at The Oddities & Curiosities Expo 2025. This event is a sight to behold and runs Oct. 18–19.
The curtain rises on the Seattle Opera’s 2025–26 season this month with The Pirates of Penzance debuting Oct. 18 with shows running through the month and ending Nov. 1. This family-friendly production earned rave reviews in upstate New York, Atlanta and St. Louis.
Halloween-themed events are happening throughout downtown. Get your pup decked out and head to Bell Street Park for Howloween on Oct. 25. First 50 costumed dogs will receive a giveaway from Mud Bay. Waterfront Park is the place to be on Oct. 31, with Waterfront Park Frights and Delights featuring costume contests, trick-or-treating and live music.
Notes on Sources
Downtown foot traffic data are provided by Placer.ai and are based on cell phone location data. Each person is counted once per day. International visitors are not included. Subsets of this data in the charts are as follows:
- Office worker presence is estimated based on visits by workers who were present between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. on weekdays in downtown Seattle.*
- Hotel data are based on monthly reports from STR, provided by Visit Seattle.
- Apartment occupancy data are from CoStar. This is reported quarterly but the current quarter data are updated in real-time as new information is added to the database.
- Domestic visitors counts those who do not live or work downtown.
- Total foot traffic includes all visits to downtown by domestic visitors, residents and workers.
- Pike Place Market visitors includes domestic visitors who do not live or work at the Pike Place Market.
*Note that workers who have not visited their work site in the past 90 days are classified as “visitors” until they are regularly visiting their work site at least three times in a one-week period.