04/15/2026
FYI
It’s official, Centralia Balloon Fest will be at FAIRVIEW PARK on August 21, 22, & 23, 2026 🥳
We’ve heard your concerns about the move and we want to address each one to ensure that it is a positive experience for the community and attendees:
- The size of Fairview Park is very similar to the area we used at Foundation Park.
- No vehicles of any kind will be allowed into Fairview Park. (Golf carts, cars, etc.)
- Official Balloon Fest parking will be Fairview Park Plaza, thank you to Ipanema Management.
- A portion of Broadway will be closed from vehicle traffic to allow safe pedestrian crossing from Fairview Park Plaza into Fairview Park.
- No alcohol will be allowed in the park at anytime during Balloon Fest.
- Crossing guards will be in place at high-traffic areas to help ESDA.
- Security guards will be staffed at Fairview Park during Balloon Fest to help Centralia Police, though this is no change from previous years.
- ESDA will provide overnight security, which is also the same in previous years.
- Our Grounds Committee will pick up trash at the end of the event to keep Centralia beautiful.
Our goal is to have the same number of craft vendors, food vendors, and hot air balloons. Like many years prior, we plan to have half of the hot air balloons glow on Friday and the other half glow on Saturday. For the evening flights, we plan to launch some balloons from Fairview Park and the others in surrounding areas to fly over the park. As always, balloon events are weather permitting.
Even if all 35 hot air balloons could fit in Fairview Park, we do not plan to have all of them take off from the park for traffic and safety reasons.
We met with the Centralia Foundation, owners of Foundation Park. We came to an agreement that there are electric issues, some of which may be corrected in a timely manner. However, there are other concerns that need attention on our end, but these things take time to plan, budget, and implement. We are continuing to work with them to see if it may become feasible for Balloon Fest to return to Foundation Park in the future.
We want to thank the City of Centralia for being so welcoming of our event and doing everything in their power to ensure Balloon Fest stays in Centralia. With such short notice, the city has done everything in their power to make sure the transition to Fairview Park is as smooth as possible. We have been in touch with Centralia Police, Fire, ESDA, and Public Works to plan a safe Balloon Fest and we will continue to work very closely with them.
Thank you to our Chamber Board for navigating this difficult situation with us, and thank you to Steering Committee for putting the interest of the event first to make it as great as possible!
We look forward to Centralia Balloon Fest 2026 at Fairview Park Centralia! Last but not least, it will be FREE!
As always, more details will be available as we keep pushing and planning. Stay tuned, keep following along, and thank you to everyone that trusts us with southern Illinois’ biggest hot air balloon event 😎
