I have lived in downtown Hartford since 2004. I am female. I walk around all the time, including in the evenings, and feel perfectly safe. As a general rule of thumb, you should not go walking in any park at night, and most parks are open from dawn to dusk for a reason (including Central Park in NYC). Lord knows Hartford is not perfect. (what city is?) and it has a reputation as a commuter-only town, but there are 120k people who actually live here, plenty of whom live downtown and walk around safely all the time. And if you are the type of person who does not wait for events to show up on their doorstep, and actually goes out and looks for things to do, signs up for newsletters/follows organizations on social media for information about things to do, you will find plenty to do here in Hartford. It is full of creative & talented people who enrich their own and others’ lives. We have live music, art shows, street festivals, farmers markets, independent theaters, etc. Go on hartford.com and look at the Events tab and sign up for their newsletter. Check out SoDo-Hartford.com for a things to do page. To me, anyone who says “there’s nothing to do in Hartford” either 1) is comparing Hartford to New York City and is expecting 24 hr Times Square on every corner and/or 2) hasn’t actually looked for things to do the way they would if they were visiting another city for the first time.

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