When it comes to getting people back downtown, Baltimore is well behind cities in the South but on pace with its slower Northeastern neighbors.
That’s according to new data from the University of Toronto School of Cities and the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, which have been analyzing GPS data from more than 18 million North American smartphones to determine how downtown visits compare to pre-pandemic totals.
In Baltimore, downtown visits are now only 68% of their 2019 levels. That compares to the national average of 74%.
Baltimore’s traffic puts it low down on the list at No. 47 out of 66 North American cities ranked in the data, but the city still compares favorably to other nearby cities that are struggling to draw people back. Philadelphia is No. 49 with 67% of its 2019 numbers, Pittsburgh is No. 52 with 66% and New York is No. 54 with 66%.
