Trịnh Công Sơn: the pedestrian street that keeps changing, and the peach gardens behind it

Quieter than Xuân Diệu, and further from everything

Trịnh Công Sơn is about five hundred metres of lakeside road on the far northern shore, in what was Nhật Tân village. It is the quietest of the seven big-listing Tây Hồ streets, and the trade-off for that quiet is distance.

The pedestrian street: what happened to it

The street’s most-advertised feature needs correcting. Trịnh Công Sơn opened as a pedestrian street in May 2018. Vietnamese press reported it drew crowds for about three months and then emptied out. In November 2023 the pedestrian street was reported as formally ceasing operation, with Tây Hồ converting it into a creative cultural space running events and concerts on Saturdays and Sundays. Later coverage still describes it as operating. The format has changed at least twice, and until recently we could not tell you which version was running, because every account we had was somebody else’s.

We can tell you now. Our team in Hanoi described the street to us in August 2026: it runs as a walking street, cars cannot come in from the main approaches at weekends, and there is normally a show on the main stage in the centre of the area, with singing and dancing. That is a person who lives in Hanoi describing what is there, which is a better source than any of the coverage above.

The weekend show, and what it means if you rent near the stage

Take the stage seriously before you sign, because it is the kind of thing nobody mentions at a viewing. A show with singing and dancing, in the centre of the area, as a normal part of most weekends, is a completely different proposition depending on which way your flat faces and how far along the street it sits. At a few hundred metres it is atmosphere. From a bedroom looking at the stage it is your Saturday and Sunday evenings, and it is not something you can renegotiate once the lease is signed.

View at a weekend if you possibly can. A Tuesday morning viewing on this street tells you almost nothing, which is exactly the trap. If you cannot get there at a weekend, ask us how far the address is from the main stage and which way it faces, and we will find out. This is the position as our team in Hanoi described it in August 2026, and a street that has already changed format twice may change again.

Nhật Tân, the peach village that turns the street into a car park each Tết

What does not change is Nhật Tân behind it. The peach gardens run down towards the Red River and are the source of most of the peach blossom sold in Hanoi at Tết. In the fortnight before the lunar new year the area fills with buyers, growers, delivery vans and photographers. If you like that, it is the best seat in the city. If you commute by motorbike, plan for it.

What is within a short walk

On the street itself there is a WinMart, Jewel Diner, a bia hơi, Sakura Clinic, an Agribank branch, the Nhật Tân ward culture house and Phan Chu Trinh High School. It is thin compared with Xuân Diệu, and that is the point. Hồ Tây Water Park and the West Lake Flower Valley are a few minutes west along the shore.

Who it suits

Rent here if you want lake on your doorstep, a short walk to Nhật Tân’s food, and you accept a ten to fifteen minute ride to the Xuân Diệu cluster. Do not rent here expecting the pedestrian street of the 2018 photographs, and do not rent within earshot of the stage until you have heard it for yourself.