VIOLATION: Flight Market

Night Market is one of the best things about Philadelphia and nice weather. The city shuts down a street in a neighborhood. Food trucks by the dozens line the street. Artists and musicians perform. Thousands of people mill the street drinking beers and eating good food. The lines for some food trucks can be the only real downfall.

Here a picture from a Night Market in Chinatown (courtesy of Food Trust):

NightMarket_ChinaTown

I love the Food Trust people. They do a great job with the Night Markets and an amazing job organizing Farmers Markets around town.

Now, they’ve decided to team up with the Linc and hold a Flight Market at Lincoln Financial Field Sunday April 19. I received this in my inbox this morning:

flightmarket

This bugs me. Whey did they have to ruin a perfectly good local neighborhood event and pretty much corporatize it?

The thing that makes Night Market great, aside from walking around with open containers and great food, is that it allows people to explore a neighborhood. For instance, the Washington Avenue Night Market.  You hang out in the street, try out a few food trucks and when it wraps up you can explore the surrounding neighborhood. Maybe a drink at Friendly Lounge or Royal Tavern or Connies Ric Rac. There’s a nice sense of community being with thousands of people wandering around a neighborhood.

AND it was free to have access to these trucks and performers.

Flight Market isn’t free. It’s $12 or $15 to get in depending on when you purchase your ticket. It’s also a rain or shine event so there are no refunds. Why they hell would anyone buy their ticket in advance? There’s no fun in a Flight Market in the rain. I’d rather pay the extra $3 rain insurance.

So what do you get for the $15? Access to trucks that you can access for free on any of the upcoming Night Markets. A special appearance by Swoop and Eagles Cheerleaders? A field tour? Does that consist of: there’s the scoreboard, this is grass, that’s the team’s entrance? Oh, there’s a flea market.

This is a total violation. Why jump the shark and make something that is unique and quirky and turn it into a generic, sterile, money-grubbing event? Are they selling beer? If so, is it typical stadium prices?

I’m sitting this one out. It feels like it goes against everything that makes Night Market fun. If you want to experience an event like this, get your ass to a good neighborhood Market instead of one in a giant stadium riddled with corporate logos and sponsorship. No thanks. I’ll have none of it.

What’s with the name Flight Market? Isn’t Flight Night enough. They’re the Eagles, not the Rockets or Jets. The use of Flight is overdone at this point. Are we gonna have to suffer through events of anything that rhymes with Flight?Maybe they’ll show that Michael J. Fox hit Bright Lights, Big City on a jumbotron and call it Flight Lights, Big City. An outdoor concert with Night Ranger of Sister Christian fame and call it Flight Ranger?