Mobile Entertainment District Expansion to Regions Arena Introduced Amid Go-Cup Concerns

MOBILE, Ala. — The City of Mobile is considering expanding its downtown entertainment district boundaries to include the new Regions Arena.

A proposed ordinance sponsored by Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis and Councilmember Samantha Ingram would expand Entertainment District 1 to cover the arena.

What an Entertainment District Does

Entertainment districts allow people to carry alcoholic drinks in designated open containers within their boundaries, subject to city rules.

The concept originated in Alabama with legislation permitting municipalities to designate limited areas where the ordinary prohibition on open containers does not apply. The usual requirement is that drinks be purchased from a licensed establishment inside the district and carried in a designated cup that identifies them as compliant.

The practical effect is to let a downtown function as a single connected venue rather than a collection of separate rooms. A patron can leave one establishment and walk to another without finishing or abandoning a drink, which changes how people move through a district over the course of an evening.

What the Ordinance Would and Would Not Change

The proposal leaves Entertainment District 2 unchanged.

It also keeps Bienville Square, Cathedral Square and Mardi Gras Park excluded.

Those three exclusions are deliberate and worth noting. All are public parks and civic gathering spaces in downtown Mobile, used for festivals, markets, concerts and everyday public life. Excluding them preserves them as spaces where open containers are not permitted regardless of what happens on the surrounding streets — a distinction that matters to families and to the events those parks host.

City leaders say the expanded districts meet state requirements for the number of qualifying alcohol licensees and the maximum district size. Alabama’s enabling law sets both a minimum density of licensed establishments and a ceiling on physical area, which prevents a municipality from designating a district so large that the open-container allowance effectively applies citywide.

Why the Arena Changes the Calculation

Regions Arena is being built on the site of the former Mobile Civic Center and represents the largest single addition to downtown Mobile’s event capacity in decades.

A venue of that scale brings thousands of people downtown for a single event, concentrated in the hours before and after. Whether those people spend money at surrounding restaurants and bars — or arrive shortly before the doors open and leave immediately afterward — is the difference between an arena that lifts a downtown and one that merely occupies space in it.

Including the arena in the entertainment district removes a small friction from the first pattern. It makes the walk between a pre-event dinner and the venue continuous rather than segmented.

The Arena’s Timeline

The arena has faced construction delays. City leaders had hoped it would open in time for Mobile’s 2027 Mardi Gras festivities, but Mayor Cheriogotis announced on Sept. 11 that the timetable had slipped, describing the original plan as “extremely ambitious” and citing rainy weather earlier in the year.

An exact opening date has not been announced.

Adopting the district expansion in advance of opening is sensible sequencing. Ordinances require adoption and publication, signage has to be installed, and licensed establishments need to understand the boundaries before the first large event rather than after it.

The Mardi Gras Connection

The former Mobile Civic Center, which occupied the arena site, hosted numerous Mardi Gras balls. Mobile’s Mardi Gras tradition — the oldest organized Carnival celebration in the United States — depends on venue capacity during a compressed season, and the Civic Center’s loss removed a substantial share of it.

That is part of why the 2027 Mardi Gras target mattered, and part of why the slipped timetable registered locally as more than a construction delay.

What Happens Next

The ordinance would take effect after City Council adoption and publication as required by law.

Ordinances of this kind follow a standard municipal path: introduction, consideration by the council, a vote, and then publication before the provisions become enforceable. That publication requirement exists so that the public and affected businesses have notice of a change in what the law permits.

Update: What State Law Requires

The ordinance, sponsored by Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis and Councilmember Samantha Ingram, would expand both Entertainment District 1, to take in the new Regions Arena, and Entertainment District 3. The boundaries of Entertainment District 2 would not change.

Under Alabama Code Section 28-3A-17.1(c), each entertainment district must contain at least four licensees holding qualifying alcohol licenses and may not exceed one-half mile by one-half mile in area, though it may be irregularly shaped. The city says it reviewed area calculations and license information and found both expanded districts comply.

Existing exclusions in the city code, including Bienville Square Park, Cathedral Square Park and Mardi Gras Park, would remain in effect. The ordinance would take effect after adoption and publication.

Downtown Leaders on Safety and the Walk to the Arena

The proposal would extend Entertainment District 1 south to take in Regions Arena, the 10,000-seat venue replacing the former Mobile Civic Center, whose first announced show is the Red Clay Strays’ grand opening concert on March 26, 2027, with St. Paul and The Broken Bones opening.

“I think it was always part of the plan to extend that entertainment area down to the arena so folks could have their drinks and dinner out on Dauphin Street, walk over to the arena, enjoy a show without any issues,” Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis said.

Under Mobile’s rules, patrons of participating, properly licensed businesses may leave with one alcoholic drink in a branded paper or plastic cup of 16 ounces or less and carry it within the same district. Drinks may not be carried into another licensed business, and cans, bottles and ordinary glass containers are not allowed on streets, sidewalks or parking lots. Being inside the district does not automatically let a business sell drinks to go; it must hold the appropriate alcohol license and entertainment-district designation.

Fred Rendfrey, president of the Downtown Mobile Alliance, said the expansion is about creating a safer, more intentional route between downtown businesses and the arena. “The entertainment district and including the path and curating the right path from Dauphin Street to the Civic Center is going to be important because people need to park, people need to be able to walk to their establishments, people need to be able to walk from the restaurants back to the Civic Center,” he said. “Doing these things in advance and being thoughtful about them is going to help kind of curate a better, safer scene for everybody.”

Rendfrey acknowledged that a larger district will require active oversight. “The hospitality districts create a certain level of good and bad and they require an intense level of management and an intense level of oversight,” he said. “So will there be problems? Yes, it’s not all perfect, but Downtown Mobile Alliance, the City of Mobile, the Police Department, I think we’re ready to make sure that we have a good season and a good experience.”

Cheriogotis said the city is reviewing safety measures for larger crowds, including lighting, directing pedestrian traffic and officer presence around major events. “You’ve got to feel safe when you’re going out and spending your free time going to a concert, going to a monster truck rally, going out on Dauphin Street,” he said. “When it comes to safety, it’s something we’re always trying to improve on.” He added that the city must also make sure visitors follow the district rules, including using approved cups from approved businesses.

The council was expected to take up the expansion on Tuesday, Sept. 22, when the City Council Public Safety Committee was also expected to discuss the downtown juvenile curfew.

What the District 3 Changes Would Add

Alongside the arena, the proposal would add three smaller areas to Entertainment District 3, bringing in additional businesses and properties along Government Street and Dauphin Street. The arena site would be the largest single piece of the expansion.

“This expansion will allow those licensed establishments in the district boundary to be able to sell a drink to go,” Downtown Mobile Alliance President and CEO Fred Rendfrey said. “These amendments will allow Deer Fish to be included. It will allow for new hospitality concept the Atchison Real Estate and Development is doing on Warren Street to be included.”

Rendfrey said the character of downtown nightlife has shifted as the area has grown. “It’s sort of evolved from, you know, college bars to more chef-driven restaurants,” he said. “It’s a little bit of everything.”

The ordinance was scheduled to be introduced to the Mobile City Council on Tuesday, Sept. 22.

Update: Ordinance introduced as council raises go-cup enforcement concerns (Sept. 22, 2026)

The Mobile City Council on Tuesday, Sept. 22, formally introduced the ordinance that would expand Entertainment District 1 to take in the Regions Arena area. The measure was introduced but not voted on, and it returns to the council for consideration next week, when a vote could come.

Council members voiced support for bringing the arena into the district, but several said the city first needs to do a better job enforcing the rules in the districts that already exist.

New boundary details

Beyond the arena itself, the District 1 boundaries would include the sidewalks on both sides of Spanish Plaza, but not the park. In another part of downtown, a separate district would expand slightly to take in a property on Government and South Bayou streets where developers plan to build a restaurant and Deerfish Distilling Co.

Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis said the arena belongs in the district for reasons beyond linking it to nearby bars and restaurants. “We’re gonna have a great lawn out there once this arena is open,” he said. “I think there’s a lot of opportunity for outdoor events and things that might not be possible without this entertainment district overlay.”

Fred Rendfrey, president and CEO of the Downtown Mobile Alliance, described the goal as a seamless night out. “The scene that I think we all aspire to have is one where you can go catch a drink or a meal before your performance, and then go catch your monster truck race, your, you know, ice skating, your concert, and do it in a safe, family-friendly way,” he said.

“Not a BYOB party”

Councilman Josh Woods said he supports the arena expansion but has seen the existing rules ignored.

“I’ve even witnessed it myself on a weekend afternoon. Instead of the LoDa cups that you’re supposed to be having, there’s people walking around with open containers, possibly coming over with open containers they made somewhere else,” Woods said. “That’s not what the purpose of the entertainment district is.”

Woods said the districts were created to draw customers downtown and support businesses that have invested there. “The whole purpose was to benefit and make a collective place where these businesses can benefit,” he said.

He does not yet have a specific proposal, but suggested the city consider more noticeable or uniform cups that officers can identify from a distance. “Before we expand these districts, we need to also look at enforcement,” Woods said.

Cheriogotis agreed. “We don’t want it to be a BYOB party,” he said. “That’s not why it was created. We want to make sure that this is supporting the businesses and the entertainment district and not just creating outdoor field parties in the middle of the street.”

The mayor said Mobile police already work to keep downtown streets safe, but he wants more attention on go-cup compliance. “That doesn’t mean we have to write everybody a ticket. Some warnings can suffice, but there’s certainly some more that we can do on the enforcement side,” he said.

What the rules allow

Customers of participating, properly licensed businesses may carry one alcoholic drink outdoors within the district where it was bought, in a paper or plastic cup marked with the business’ logo or the LoDa logo. Cans, bottles and ordinary glass are not allowed on streets, sidewalks or parking lots, and drinks cannot be carried into another licensed business or across the area separating one district from another.

Rendfrey said steps have already been taken to curb problems, such as banning parking on Dauphin Street during LoDa ArtWalk events so people cannot hold drinking parties out of their car trunks. He called the district concept a success overall. “It’s important to the licensees,” he said. “It’s important to the vibes downtown. … It certainly requires a lot of management.”

Woods said the larger goal is a downtown that works for everyone. “Anything that we can do to make sure that people from all across the city can come down here and have an enjoyable time with their family, we need to make sure that we do everything we can to make sure it’s safe, clean and it’s an environment for everybody,” he said.

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