Project Overview

In 2026, Philadelphia and other host cities will put on FIFA Fan Fest, a continuous watch party and entertainment event for the World Cup hosted in the same location for the duration of the tournament - 40 days and 40 nights. On top of this major international event, the city will be commemorating America’s Semiquincentennial and hosting the MLB All star game. Collectively, the United States and the World are coming to Philadelphia, which begs the question: how can neighborhoods leverage these events to host their own celebrations in 2026 easily, affordably and equitably? 

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We are imagining neighborhoods around the city of Philadelphia adopting one of the most fun parts of experiencing the FIFA World Cup: the myriad of local public viewing events where fans can watch the festivities with their neighbors. This is a very common practice in many countries, as local groups organize small-to-medium-sized events for their community to gather, watch and celebrate. Organizing such events requires the event planning process to be simple, neighborhood open space to be available and well-maintained, and vendors to be able to easily serve the needs of event-goers. Our goal is to help Philadelphia residents reach these conditions. While our policy recommendations are designed to be utilized in 2026, we hope our ideas could usher in a new age of community event planning in Philadelphia beyond this monumental summer.

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This project group features the work of Katie Hanford, Sidney Kuesters and Yang Yang.