Unspecified/General

Cutting through the heart of the French Quarter, Bourbon Street runs about thirteen blocks from Canal Street to Esplanade Avenue and is, for many visitors, shorthand for New Orleans nightlife. Its name has nothing to do with the whiskey; the royal engineer Adrien de Pauger laid out the Quarter's grid in the early 1720s and named the street for the House of Bourbon, the family then ruling France. The city itself had been founded a few years earlier, in 1718. For roughly its first century and a half the street was largely residential and mixed, lined with Creole townhouses rather than bars. Its modern character took shape in the early twentieth century, after the closure of the Storyville vice district pushed nightlife elsewhere; clubs, jazz rooms and restaurants gradually clustered along Bourbon, and by the 1930s it had a local reputation for entertainment that later spread nationwide. The portable drink known as the go cup is often traced to the street. Today the upper blocks toward Canal Street carry the densest run of bars, music venues, souvenir shops and adult clubs, where open-container rules let crowds drink as they wander and balconies overflow during Mardi Gras and festivals. Older establishments survive among the neon: Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop, a tavern in a building dating to the 1770s, and traditional jazz rooms such as Fritzel's keep a thread of history running through the noise. Opinions on the street are sharply divided. To its supporters it is the engine of the city's tourism and a place of genuine music and revelry; to its critics it trades on spectacle and excess at the expense of the Quarter's deeper culture. Either way, it remains one of the most visited spots in New Orleans, loudest after dark and during the carnival season, and quietest in the early morning when cleaning crews hose down the pavements before the crowds return. Music spills from open doorways most evenings, ranging from brass bands and zydeco to cover acts and karaoke, and the daiquiri shops and balcony bars stay busy late. Visitors are usually advised to keep valuables close in the crowds and to wander a block or two off Bourbon for a quieter, more residential side of the Quarter.

Type: Tourist Attraction

Address: Bourbon Street, New Orleans, United States