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
November 2024 (October 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.
Total monthly visitors since 2019
Nearly 2.4 million unique visitors came downtown in October 2024. This represents 93% of the visitors seen in October 2019, and is about even with the number of visitors seen in October 2023.
Average daily worker foot traffic (Monday–Friday)
In October, downtown averaged more than 93,000 workers per weekday — the 2nd-highest figure since March 2020. This represents an 8% increase from October 2023, and is 56% of October 2019’s weekday average.
Monthly hotel rooms sold compared to 2019
There were nearly 380,000 downtown hotel rooms sold in October 2024. This figure represents 100% of the demand in October 2019. October 2024 represented the 6th consecutive month where hotel demand met or exceeded the comparable month in 2019.
In October, the number of occupied apartment units downtown continued growing, rising to nearly 59,000. This represented a 4% increase compared to Q4 2023 and a 16% increase compared to Q4 2019.
Of Note in Downtown
There was a 44% decrease in graffiti tags and stickers removed in October in the Downtown Activation Team area within the MID compared to September 2024. An increase in coordination and resources between MID ambassadors and partner agencies may have reduced visible tagging.
October 2024 saw the highest level of local visitor foot traffic downtown since March 2020. Local visitors are defined as visitors who live within 10 miles of downtown.
Coming Up in Downtown
A Broadway sensation is packing the Paramount in downtown Seattle with “Wicked” casting its spell through Dec. 1. The Seattle Theatre Group expects 90,000 people to see this show while it’s in town.
The Seattle Christmas Market returns to Seattle Center Nov. 21–Dec. 24, creating a special holiday village in the heart of the city. New this year is a double-decker carousel with unlimited free rides (after paid entrance to the market). More than 185,000 tickets were sold to this festive pop-up last season.
DSA’s Tree Lighting Celebration, on Friday, Nov. 29, marks the official start of the holidays downtown. This festive Seattle tradition also includes the lighting of the iconic Holiday Star and a spectacular fireworks show.
COVID-19 Downtown Recovery Weekly Snapshot
These charts show weekly statistics from March 2020 through the most recent week available. To indicate the level of recovery, data is displayed as a percent of the same metric for the comparable week of 2019.
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 the downtown neighborhoods with the heaviest concentration of office space.*
- Total visitors includes those who do not live or work downtown. It does not include international visitors.
- 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.