Porchfest seems to keep growing year after year, and this year brought a lot of talk of how it has become too big to manage. In fact, I heard a lot of folks referring to this as potentially the final Porchfest.

Porchfest 2022 Oxford Street

I personally love Porchfest and consider it one of the best annual events in our city. But I don't haven't had to deal with inebriated people eliminating in my yard or had to deal with emergency responders trying in vain to get down a closed street full of people to get to my house. I'd like to think there's a way to address some of the issues with the event and make it function better.

Here are my suggestions for Porchfest:

  1. Many more portable restrooms. Portapotties were tough to find in some parts of the city, and the ones we did have saw some pretty long lines. We should get real about the demand for restrooms and at least triple our portapotty order for the event.
  2. Restrict which streets can host performances. If you're on a main arterial, it's crucial that the street remain unimpeded. The list of streets not allowed to host performances should include the obvious major east-west streets like Broadway or Summer Street. But with north-south through streets at a premium here, that list also should include streets like Cross, Walnut, School, Central, Cedar, Willow, and College Ave. I understand residents of these key streets might be disappointed to not be able to host a performance, their neighbors around the corner on a side street can do this with far fewer problems.
  3. Close more streets. There was a noticeable uptick in block party permits this year, and this made things safer. If we stick to side streets with performances, this should allow more street closures.
  4. Treat high-profile bands differently. If a well-known band wants to play Porchfest under their name (and not a pseudonym), they need to play a space like Trum Field. It was way too chaotic having Guster play a neighborhood residential street and that should be avoided in the future.

These are my thoughts from having attended Porchfest yet again this year, as well as from the public safety perspective after seeing what first responders are up against during the chaos it's come to cause.

Jake Wilson

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Somerville City Councilor-At-Large (he/him/él)