The METRO Light Rail is your ride to the arts this weekend in Phoenix and Tempe!

Just in time for holiday shopping, the 2009 Fall Festival of the Arts is coming to Tempe from 10 a.m. to dusk on December 4, 5 and 6. This is the 41st Annual Tempe Festival of the Arts, which has become the largest event of its kind in Arizona. More than 400 artists and crafts person will be displaying original and unique works from across the nation. Hundreds of thousands of people, more than a third of whom are visitors from outside the Phoenix metropolitan area, are expected to experience this free festival over the three-day weekend event.

With so many people heading to downtown Tempe for a street fair, it's hardly surprising that there will be road closures. The following streets will be closed from 6 p.m. on Thursday, December 3 until 5 a.m. on Monday, December 7:

• Mill Ave. will be closed in both direction between University Dr. and 3rd St.
• Maple Ave. will be closed in both directions between 4th and 7th Sts.
• 4th St. will be closed in both directions between Mill and Maple Aves.
• 5th St. will be closed in both directions between Ash Ave. and Myrtle Ave.
• 6th St. will be closed in both directions between Maple Ave. to Myrtle Ave.
• 7th St. will be closed in both directions at Mill Ave. (Local traffic only will be allowed west of Myrtle Ave. on 7th St.)

Parking, always a challenge around Mill Ave. on the weekend, is going to be even tighter during the Tempe Fall Festival of the Arts. ADA Reserved Parking will be available at the Brickyard Garage, Centerpoint Surface Lot, Hayden Square Garage and the City Parking Garage at 5t St. and Forest. In addition, 75 ADA spaces will be available at the U.S. Airways Garage on the northeast corner of 3rd St. and Ash Ave. on Saturday and Sunday only.

If you plan to attend the Fall Festival of the Arts, you may want to consider parking elsewhere and riding the METRO Light Rail or a bus into downtown Tempe. The METRO Light Rail offers more than 3,500 parking spaces at eight park-and-ride locations and has a stop at 3rd St. and Mill Ave.

As a result of the street closures several buses serving the Mill Ave. area will be detoured beginning at 6 p.m. on Thursday, December 3 until 5 a.m. on Monday December 7. The affected routes include:

• Route 62, both North- and South-bound
• Route 65 Southbound
• Route 66, both North-and South-bound
• Route 92 Northbound
• Earth Back
• Earth Forward
• Jupiter Back
• Jupiter Forward
• Mercury Eastbound
• Venus Forward
• Venus Back
• Flash Back
• Flash Forward
• Flash to University Dr.

In addition to these detoured routes, Orbit Earth will not operate a circular route during the three days of the Festival. Instead Orbit Earth will operate in two directions between the Tempe Transportation Center (southern endpoint) to north Tempe (northern endpoint) with Tempe Marketplace as the mid-point of the abbreviated route.