Downtown Tracy
This is a growing, vibrant city center with new and expanding possibilities at every corner.
It’s a unique and authentic downtown, built upon strong community ties. Downtown Tracy combines historic charm with contemporary interest, showcasing a pleasing variety of restaurants, shops, services, and entertainment. It has once again become the center of local activity for residents, businesses, and visitors. Downtown Tracy has a rich history stretching from the 19th Century to the present.
Today it has an evolving mix of retail and service businesses — and a future filled with the prospects of expanded business activity. The downtown’s commercial development is promoted and encouraged by the Tracy City Center Association, supported since its founding in 2010 by both property and business owners.
Ongoing Downtown Events:
- Weekly Summer Farmers’ Market (Year-Round, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Taps on Tenth Craft Beer Tasting (April & November, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Block Parties (May-August, Sponsored by City of Tracy)
- 4th of July Parade (July, Sponsored by Tracy Chamber of Commerce & City of Tracy)
- Blues, Brews & BBQ (September, Sponsored by City of Tracy)
- Wine Stroll (September, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Movies on the Plaza (Summer Months, Sponsored by City of Tracy)
- Downtown Artwalks (Summer Months, Sponsored by City of Tracy)
- Street Dreams Car Show (October, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Halloween Candy Crawl & Festivities (October, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Girls’ Night Out (October, Sponsored by City of Tracy)
- Holiday Ornament Stroll (December, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Holiday Light Parade & Tree Lighting Ceremony (December, Sponsored by TCCA)
- Santa’s Workshop – Visit with Santa & Mrs. Claus (December, Sponsored by TCCA)
Downtown Tracy Does It Right
Tracy is a town that loves its events, loves sharing them with residents and visitors, and has an eye on the future.
The Downtown Tracy Wine Stroll and Taps on Tenth craft beer tasting events featured here, plus a summer and winter farmers’ market, and holiday events highlight something for everyone year-round. The proposed Valley Link light rail service is a regional solution for our large commuter population, and opportunity for future downtown Transit Oriented Development (TOD). Check out the videos!
Downtown Tracy History
In 1878 construction of a new rail line was started from Oakland around the shores of San Francisco Bay, through Martinez to connect to the Central Pacific at a point three miles to the east of Ellis. The line had been built to make possible greater efficiency by avoiding hills and to eliminate the expense of helper engines. The result of the new rail line was the founding of Tracy on September 8, 1878, named for Lathrop J. Tracy, a grain merchant and railroad director in Mansfield, Ohio.
Tracy continued to grow as a railroad center. A new line through Los Banos was the fastest and least expensive to Los Angeles. In March of 1894 railroad headquarters at Lathrop were moved to Tracy. All of the railroad equipment including engines and buildings were moved. Thus, Tracy’s beginning is in fact the story of a railroad.
Businesses were initially centered on Front Street (today’s Sixth Street). After the turn of the 20th Century, commercial activity moved north on Central Avenue. As 11th Street became Highway 50, a busy thoroughfare, it fostered the creation of a number of businesses, including the historic Tracy Inn, completed in 1927. In the 1950s, businesses began locating on both sides of Central Avenue on 10th Street to complete the present downtown business district.
Tracy was incorporated in 1910 and it grew rapidly after the first irrigation district was established in 1915. Although railroad operations began to decline in the 1950s, Tracy continued to prosper as an agricultural area. Today, the City seal reflects this history of railroads and agriculture.
A major city improvement project completed in 2007 provided reconstructed streets, new street trees, expanded landscaping and redesigned sidewalks to the downtown. Also in 2007, the Grand Theatre Center for the Arts was created from a 1923 theater and three adjoining hotels. The City of Tracy Transit Station, opened in 2009, provides a handsome new anchor — and venue for community gatherings — at the corner of Sixth Street and Central Avenue on the southern end of downtown.
In addition to its role as a commercial center, Tracy’s downtown also is the center of community activities. It hosts the weekly Farmers’ Market, the annual Wine Stroll, holiday and homecoming parades, and much more.
