Last year’s Virginia Highland Porchfest put up serious numbers. Organizers estimate well over 40,000 people attended the free, single-day neighborhood festival with over 100 bands at 50 porches-turned-stages.

Things are changing this year. For the first time since it began six years ago, the May 16 Porchfest will be a ticketed event. Attendance will be capped at 40,000 people to help with crowd control over last year’s overwhelming turnout.

“We had to be thoughtful about what we did this year, because it can’t grow anymore, right?”

Virginia Highland District Association Marketing Director Sarah Miller said Porchfest has grown exponentially in just six years – about 20% every year. But there’s no room to expand. So the decision was made to cap attendance and close it to ticket holders. Currently, tickets are $15. They will be $20 on the day of the event.

The money will help pay for the ongoing cost of putting on Porchfest, but it will also help fund the Virginia Highland District Association, a nonprofit aimed at boosting the local small business district.

“We’re hoping that there is some money left over to go back into the neighborhood,” Miller said.

There aren’t many other models to compare the now-paid neighborhood festival to, but Miller referenced the Dogwood Festival’s recent decision to make the beloved Piedmont Park event a paid affair. She said Porchfest is “trialing” the model.

Residents who live inside the boundaries will be able to request free tickets. Outside of the drawn map, Virginia Highland residents will have to pay the fee. So will everybody beyond the neighborhood.

But that’s not the only change. To help with crowds, Porchfest will have a “decentralized footprint.” In previous years, all vendors and amenities were mostly concentrated on Barnett Street. Now they will be scattered across the map to open streets to pedestrians.

Miller said the festival will also have doubled amenities, like restrooms, staffing and security. The attendees are also expected to pour over into the neighborhood. According to the association, Porchfest is one of the busiest business days for establishments lining North Highland Ave. Miller said one day of the festival is enough to offset a “slow summer month.”

Despite the growth, the organizers are determined to keep the festival identity — an intimate, neighborhood feel for attendees. The association also aims to keep the festival as low-impact as possible for neighborhood residents. “We’ll make sure it will look like it never happened by the next day,” Miller said.

But the bands are the festival favorite. Dozens of local artists will take to porches and front yards to bring Atlanta sound into Virginia Highland streets.

“You get to discover a lot of new local bands that you never would have seen before,” Miller said. “Just, like, walk one block and take a right, and all of a sudden you have a new favorite band.”

The full Porchfest lineup is available online.

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