The Haunted Halsted Halloween Parade turns 30 this year. To mark it, the Northalsted Business Alliance is making Saturday, Oct. 31, "an all-day affair." A daytime street festival runs from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Then comes the parade from 7 to 8 p.m., and a costume contest and after-party run until 10 p.m. For anyone who lives in Northalsted, the parade time matters less than the start of the parking restrictions. Last year the street parking ban began in the evening. This year it starts at 7 a.m., and the organizer's notice says violators will be towed.
That one change sets the rest of the day. A car left on Roscoe or Cornelia on Friday night is a problem by breakfast on Saturday, and that street won't reopen to traffic until 2 a.m. Sunday.
The Clock Moved Back by Ten Hours
In 2025, Time Out Chicago reported that Halsted would close from Belmont to Addison from about 5 p.m. on Oct. 31 until 2 a.m. on Nov. 1. No parking was allowed on the closed streets during the same window. The 2026 notice from the Northalsted Business Alliance moves both times much earlier.
| 2025 | 2026 | |
|---|---|---|
| Street parking restrictions begin | About 5 p.m. | 7 a.m. |
| Vehicle traffic banned | About 5 p.m. | 10:30 a.m. |
| Restrictions lift | 2 a.m. Nov. 1 | 2 a.m. Nov. 1 |
| Parade step-off at Halsted and Belmont | 7:30 p.m. | 7 p.m. |
| Costume contest entry | Free | $5 |
Last year, parking restrictions on these blocks lasted about nine hours. This year they last 19. Vehicle traffic is banned for 15 and a half hours. The 2 a.m. end time is the same as before. The start moved, because the event now fills the whole day.
The Blocks Where Towing Starts at 7 a.m.
The parking restriction and the traffic ban cover the same streets. On Halsted, that's Belmont to Addison. On the cross streets, the restricted area runs to the nearest alley. The organizer lists these address ranges:
- Halsted: 3200 N. to 3600 N.
- Melrose: 720 W. to 758 W.
- Aldine: 800 W. to 830 W.
- Buckingham: 720 W. to 820 W.
- Roscoe: 732 W. to 820 W.
- Newport: 800 W. to 840 W.
- Cornelia: 732 W. to 820 W.
- Brompton: 743 W. to 800 W.
The notice says both sides of Cornelia, Roscoe, Buckingham and Aldine are affected. If your address falls in one of these ranges, plan to move your car Friday night. A 6:45 a.m. Saturday move is cutting it close on a day when everyone on your block has the same deadline.
Why the Side Streets Close All Day
You might expect a daytime festival on Halsted to close only Halsted. The vendor plan explains why the cross streets close too. The organizer says all vendors will be set up on the streets that intersect Halsted, so they can keep selling through both the block party and the evening parade. The festival itself covers five blocks of Halsted, from Aldine to Brompton. The event schedule lists that same stretch as 3300 to 3526 N. Halsted. So the side streets become the festival's back rooms, and they need to be clear by mid-morning.
The organizer's page uses three different stretches of Halsted for three different purposes, which is easy to mix up:
- Festival footprint, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.: Aldine to Brompton, pedestrian-only.
- Parade route, 7 to 8 p.m.: Belmont north to Brompton.
- Traffic and parking closure, 10:30 a.m. or 7 a.m. to 2 a.m.: Belmont to Addison.
The closure zone is the largest of the three. If you live between Brompton and Addison, the festival and parade both stop south of you, but your block is still in the no-parking area.
What Fills the Daytime Hours
The 11 a.m. start isn't just setup time for the parade. The festival has a kids zone with games, Halloween crafts and inflatables. Daytime trick-or-treating runs at more than 25 Halsted Street businesses. There's a 360-degree camera for costume photos, more than 50 local vendor and sponsor booths, live local music and street performers. Beer, spirits and fall-flavored toddies are for sale to guests 21 and older with valid ID. The organizer hasn't named the participating trick-or-treat businesses. Its featured-appearance and live-performance sections still say "More information coming soon!"
At 6 p.m., Halsted is cleared, and festival guests move to the sidewalks behind the barricades. If you want a curb spot for the 7 p.m. parade, the sidewalks start filling with people who were already on Halsted for the afternoon. In past years, the crowd arrived only for the evening.
The parade lineup includes the Windy City Jeep Club, the Lakeside Pride Marching Band, Chicago Thriller, the Windy City Rollers, the Chicago Spirit Brigade pep squad, and Chicago Full Moon Jam fire performers. The organizer says the parade ends with a pyrotechnic display from Full Moon Jam. The organizer counts more than 300 costumed parade participants and thousands of onlookers each year. The event is free and open to all ages, and it goes on in rain or snow.
If You're Entering the Costume Contest
The contest has five categories: Character, Creative, Scary, Group, and Youth under 13. Each category pays $500 for first place, $200 for second and $100 for third. Contestants must be present to win, and the Group category awards one prize. The $4,000 figure you may have seen is the total across all categories, not a single top prize.
You can register in advance through the organizer's page. Day-of entries are accepted starting at 2 p.m. at the registration tent at 3211 N. Halsted. Bib check-in runs from 2 to 6:15 p.m. at Halsted and Belmont, at a tent on the east side of the street. Judges pick finalists, who go on stage at the NoHa parking lot, 3514 N. Halsted, between 8 and 10 p.m. Live music, DJs and drag performances fill the rest of the night.
Getting There Without a Car
As of Oct. 3, the CTA had not posted a parade-day notice for the #8 Halsted bus or for Belmont station. The CTA's current #8 alert is about something else. It's a construction detour around Chicago and Halsted, scheduled from Nov. 7, 2025, through Dec. 25, 2026. Buses in both directions are rerouted via Division, Elston and Milwaukee while CDOT works at that intersection. If you ride the #8 north from the Near North Side, that detour applies on Halloween like any other day. Check the CTA's alerts page closer to Oct. 31 for anything specific to the parade.
Last year, Time Out pointed parade-goers to the Belmont stop on the Red, Brown and Purple lines, along with the #8, #22 Clark and #36 Broadway buses. The parade still starts at Halsted and Belmont this year, the same corner as in 2025.
The Rest of Lakeview's October
Halloween on Halsted is the biggest date on the calendar, but the closures touch only one corridor. Several other events this month are on different days or different streets:
- Oct. 10 to Nov. 1: Nightmare on Clark Street, a pop-up at Stolen Saddle, listed in Lakeview East's Halloween season guide.
- Saturday, Oct. 24, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.: The Northalsted Halloween Pup Crawl, trick-or-treating for dogs and their people, from Aldine to Cornelia.
- Monday, Oct. 26, 4 to 7 p.m.: Trick or Treat on Southport, a free event from Friends of Lakeview along Southport Avenue from Roscoe to Grace. The business-by-business lineup hasn't been posted yet.
- Saturday, Oct. 31, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.: Lakeview East's Little Monster Crawl, with trick-or-treating at businesses on Broadway, Belmont and Clark.
- Saturday, Oct. 31, 5 p.m. to 1 a.m.: The Wrigleyville Halloween Crawl, also listed in the Lakeview East guide.
The Little Monster Crawl overlaps the first three hours of Haunted Halsted Fest, on Broadway, Belmont and Clark. A family could start on Broadway at 11 and walk west to Halsted's kids zone in the afternoon. Southport's trick-or-treat falls on a Monday this year, five days before Halloween, so it doesn't compete with the Saturday events.
Many of the Halsted blocks closed on Oct. 31 are home to people who own along the corridor. If you're one of them and want to know how festival-season foot traffic and a 30-year-old parade tradition factor into your home's value, Vesta Preferred Realty can walk you through it block by block. Get a Home Valuation before the barricades go up.
