The annual Ultra Music Festival in Miami Florida will officially return to its home at Bayfront Park in Downtown Maimi.
After moving the 2019 edition to Virginia Key back in March, the worlds premier electronic music festival will officially be returning to its iconic location among the city skyline.
The ongoing saga of Ultra’s search for a 2020 venue has been tumultuous to say the least. After much uproar from the community, it’s been a hot topic of conversation for months and Today, Miami commissioners finally took to a vote.
Dozens of downtown Miami residents, lined up inside the commission chamber that morning to plead with officials about keeping the popular electronic music festival away from their homes after the Virginia Key venue, where it was held this year, was not a good fit.
Miami commissioners voted 3-2 in allowing the festival to return to downtown Miami, despite some criticism about the event at Thursday night’s commission meeting.
The money and panache of the iconic Miami-born global music festival is still a massive lure. “It generates business in rooms, restaurants and bars,” a woman from InterContinental Miami said. This neighborhood is no longer compatible,” Miami resident George Pelonious said. “The only green space we have downtown is completely blocked off from all the taxpayers who live there.”
“It’s beautiful to have 60,000 people from all over the world coming together to celebrate in your city,” another woman said. But the former head of the Park Trust was not happy with having Bayfront Park as an option again for Ultra. “I’ve never seen something like this. This is absurd,” Commissioner Joe Carollo said.
The trust now has rules placing limits on private events held at Bayfront Park. “We would need to waive that in order to allow for Ultra, at this point. And I don’t think we should. I think we should work within the parameters that we set,” Commissioner Ken Russell said.
Carollo and Rusell, who represents downtown Miami residents, were the only two commissioners who voted against bringing Ultra back to Bayfront Park. Commissioners still need to waive the new rules at the park that limit private events. Ultra is offering to limit hours and decibel levels during its multiday festival.
Open Top Resistance Stage to be Removed
Buried in the deal is a huge piece of news that was just learned at the meeting. Apparently, the area where the Arcadia Spider stage formerly stood will be eliminated completely in order to keep the children’s park open to the public. After some back and forth, it became unclear if that was the plan or not. At this time it’s not known.