Saints Parade Route and Vital Stats

The New Orleans Saints will be given a heroes' welcome from their hometown fans starting at 5 p.m. local time on Tuesday evening with a huge parade. According to television station WDSU out of New Orleans, the parade will feature 10 floats from a Mardi Gras parade as well as marching bands. The parade starts at the Superdome and ends at the Convention Center near the river. Along the way, the route follows along downtown New Orleans from Howard up St. Charles Avenue past Lafayette Square where it jogs up and down Canal Street before it goes south on Fulton where it ends at the convention center. Much of the parade is just off the historic French Quarter and happens mostly in the Warehouse District.

Tickets for grandstands, sold by hotels and given away by the mayor's office, are already sold out. WDSU also reports that players and coaches will be riding on the floats so the best way to see them will be to view the parade from street level. If you want to get a good view of the street, get there early since many schools are going to be closed on the day of the parade. The mayor's office predicts up to 200,000 people will line the parade route to honor their hometown heroes.

Saints fans took to the streets in a relatively mild celebration after the victory, and fans flocked to the airport to greet their beloved Saints as they returned from Miami. The city will have even more to celebrate on February 16^th as Mardi Gras culminates in huge parades for which New Orleans is known.

Hurricane Katrina has been forgotten, as the site of the devastation in 2005 has been turned into a parade of triumph for a team that has supported the city of New Orleans on its collective backs. Spirits of the city have risen to meteoric levels since their underdog Saints won the very first Super Bowl in which they have participated.The parade was going to happen in their honor regardless of the outcome of the game. Proceeds of the sale of tickets for the grandstands will be donated to charity.