Cite as: 505 U. S. 672 (1992)
Opinion of the Court
maining public property. Limitations on expressive activity conducted on this last category of property must survive only a much more limited review. The challenged regulation need only be reasonable, as long as the regulation is not an effort to suppress the speaker's activity due to disagreement with the speaker's view. Ibid.
The parties do not disagree that this is the proper framework. Rather, they disagree whether the airport terminals are public fora or nonpublic fora. They also disagree whether the regulation survives the "reasonableness" review governing nonpublic fora, should that prove the appropriate category.4 Like the Court of Appeals, we conclude that the terminals are nonpublic fora and that the regulation reasonably limits solicitation.
The suggestion that the government has a high burden in justifying speech restrictions relating to traditional public fora made its first appearance in Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization, 307 U. S. 496, 515, 516 (1939). Justice Roberts, concluding that individuals have a right to use "streets and parks for communication of views," reasoned that such a right flowed from the fact that "streets and parks . . . have immemorially been held in trust for the use of the public and, time out of mind, have been used for purposes of assembly, communicating thoughts between citizens, and discussing public questions." We confirmed this observation in Frisby v. Schultz, 487 U. S. 474, 481 (1988), where we held that a residential street was a public forum.
Our recent cases provide additional guidance on the characteristics of a public forum. In Cornelius we noted that a traditional public forum is property that has as "a principal purpose . . . the free exchange of ideas." 473 U. S., at 800. Moreover, consistent with the notion that the government— like other property owners—"has power to preserve the
4 Respondent also argues that the regulations survive under the strict scrutiny applicable to public fora. We find it unnecessary to reach that question.
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