Champaign, IL Public Conduct: Skateboarding Rules (2026)

Section 33-26 of the Champaign City Code, titled Traffic on Downtown Pedestrian Mall, lists an extensive set of prohibited devices: motor vehicles, motorcycles, motor-driven cycles, mopeds, unicycles, bicycles, tricycles, sidewalk bicycles, skates, skateboards and similar devices. The ordinance covers not just riding but any operation, pushing or use of such a device on the Mall, which the Code pins down geographically as Taylor Street from the brick covered pavement west to Neil Street, the historic core of downtown Champaign. The section traces to Code 1975 Section 22-63 and was carried forward by Council Bill No.

86-297 in 1986 when the City formally established the pedestrian mall. Because the ban names skateboards specifically alongside bicycles and skates, a skateboarder cannot argue the rule was written only with cars in mind; the text reaches wheeled recreational devices by name. The only carve-outs are authorized maintenance or emergency vehicles, hand trucks or carts, strollers, walkers and wheelchairs, meaning even non-motorized foot scooters or child-sized ride toys fall outside the exempted list and remain barred from the brick-paved blocks. Champaign Police officers patrol the Mall and enforce the closure as part of routine downtown patrol, since the corridor sits amid restaurants, bars and retail where pedestrian conflicts with wheeled traffic are the precise harm the Council targeted in 1986.