Lower Merion, PA Public Conduct: Public Alcohol Use (2026)

Article IVA of Chapter 111, Peace and Good Order, added in 1978, defines its terms before stating the ban. 'Open container' is defined broadly in § 111-4.1 to include any glass, mug, opened bottle, punctured can, tapped keg or repurposed jar or jug that once held something else, but it excludes a bag, box or other wrapping around a still-sealed container. 'Public place' means any public street or public real estate, and 'public real estate' is defined as land or buildings owned or leased by the Township or the Lower Merion School District, expressly excluding Township parks and playgrounds, because alcohol possession in parks is separately addressed under Chapter 109, § 109-14, which bars drinking or possessing alcohol in a park except at Appleford and Harriton under a permit from their respective committees.

Within that public-place definition, § 111-4.2 then states the operative rule: no person, and no firm, corporation or other organization, may drink an alcoholic beverage or possess an open container of one, whether inside or outside a motor vehicle, on or in any public place in the Township. Because the definition of 'public street' sweeps in the entire right-of-way of any street, road or highway within the Township, including sidewalks and unpaved shoulders, and regardless of whether it is a Township, county or state road, the ban reaches ordinary sidewalks and roadside areas as well as Township-owned buildings and grounds.