Fort Wayne preparing for downtown outdoor refreshment area
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Officials in Fort Wayne are getting ready to launch the city’s first Designated Outdoor Refreshment Area, or DORA, in the downtown area as soon as this summer.
Once implemented, the DORA will allow patrons to take alcoholic drinks outside of an approved establishment as long as they stay within the permitted boundaries.
The process for creating the designated areas was established through the passage of Senate Enrolled Act 20 by the Indiana General Assembly in 2023, authored by Sen. Liz Brown, R-Fort Wayne.
Preston Wallace, director of marketing for Downtown Fort Wayne, told Inside INdiana Business the effort comes at the perfect time for the city’s downtown.
“It’s conceptually something that started out as The Landing here in downtown Fort Wayne, which is a revitalized dining and cultural district,” Wallace said. “That was where the DORA was initially; [it] was specifically going to be within that footprint from one end of the street to the other. And in conversations and talking with some of our business operators in the bar and restaurant industry, we decided to kind of grow that, scale it a little bit more.”
Downtown Fort Wayne’s DORA will run east to west from Calhoun to Harrison Streets and north to south from Promenade Park to Four Winds Field.
“It’s the bulk of the concentrated area of downtown Fort Wayne, where you experience a lot of the different events programming,” he said. “There’s a good number of bars and restaurants within that footprint itself. So as far as the entertainment and attractions go, a lot of its going to be within that footprint.”
The DORA allows bars and restaurants to serve alcohol in designated to-go cups, which Wallace said not only allows the establishments to know who is coming and going from their place of business with a legal cup, but also helps law enforcement.
“All the laws that are already in place will continue to remain in place, so obviously no underage drinking,” he said. “We need to make sure that we’re keeping an eye on public intoxication, things of that nature.”
Wallace said city officials have been in contact with similar-sized markets that already have DORAs in place, such as Kalamazoo, Michigan, and Toledo, Ohio. In Toledo, he said the city goes through up to 180,000 cups each year.
“The business owners within the district that they have have shared nothing but absolute success with the initiative and the programming. I think it adds the vibrancy. I think it makes programming and events, particularly an event that’s outdoor or a hybrid of an indoor-outdoor event more accessible to the public.”
Currently, 17 businesses within the designated area are participating, Wallace said, with four more coming into the fold soon. He noted some businesses had concerns about potential liability issues, but ultimately threw their support behind the initiative.
“All of our businesses that are bars and restaurants within the hospitality industry have signed up to be a participating vendor,” he said. “Beyond the initial rollout of this and then signing up to be a vendor and sell those to-go cups, they get to make the rules of what happens within their four walls within their space.”
The Fort Wayne Common Council did the same, approving the DORA unanimously back in December.
Now, Downtown Fort Wayne is working with the city’s Community Development Division to ensure that proper signage is installed throughout the area noting the boundaries of the DORA. They’re also finalizing the specific cups that will be used in the district.
The city hoped to launch the DORA in time for St. Patrick’s Day, but Wallace noted that was an aggressive goal that wasn’t quite feasible. He said they hope to announce a launch date within the coming weeks.
“At this point, we’re really looking forward to hopefully having everything rolled out at the beginning of summer.”