Pittsburgh public schools will close for the Wednesday to Friday of draft week

The NFL draft comes to Pittsburgh next month. And Pittsburgh is bracing for an influx of humanity.

Via WTAE-TV, Pittsburgh public schools will be closed from Wednesday, April 22, through Friday, April 24. The development was attributed to “the significant increase in visitors expected across the region during the 2026 NFL Draft.”

“We know it’s not ideal, but it is a reality of a city hosting a big event where we’re expecting about 500,000-700,000 visitors into our city, and it will completely create sort of [an] exciting time, but also some challenging times when we think about accessibility, transportation, and safety,” Superintendent Wayne Walters said.

Pittsburgh public school students will engage in remote learning on those three days.

It’s always hard to know the precise number of attendees at the draft, because the final tally usually includes the same people being counted multiple times as they enter, and re-enter, the perimeter on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

Saturday’s number last year in Green Bay, for example, was higher than Thursday’s because people come and go throughout the most uneventful day of the draft, leaving the immediate area of the festivities and returning. (And leaving and returning.)

Still, even if the official attendance is much higher than the total number of unique attendees, a lot of people will be in Pittsburgh for the draft. Excitement has been building in and around the region for months.

Whatever the real number of visitors to Pittsburgh for the draft, the league has turned its primary offseason tentpole event — which could be conducted by group text message — into a spectacle far bigger than it has ever been. And it all happened because a scheduling conflict at Radio City Music Hall in 2015 prompted the league to say, “Screw it. Let’s go to Chicago this year.”