RochesterFest Competing With Carnival For Visitors This Weekend

Rochester’s annual community celebration kicked off last weekend and goes through Sunday, with most of the events happening at Soldier’s Field in downtown Rochester. Until now, the multi-day event ran unopposed, but starting tonight, Rochesterfest will have to compete with a carnival to attract visitors. The carnival will open in the Apache Mall parking lot, only a few blocks away from the Rochesterfest grounds, on Thursday evening and run through Sunday.

Is Rochester big enough to support two competing events that are going on at the same time? We asked our listeners that question this morning and got a lot of feedback. You can read some of their comments and see what the Executive Director of RochesterFest had to say about the carnival below.

RochesterFest Event Info
Apache Mall Carnival Info

Rochesterfest Executive Director, Brandon Helgeson, was asked about the carnival and told KTTC, "Obviously it's disheartening to see something like that take place when we have our city festival going on."

Reaction from Residents:

• Christopher Stehlik said his family will go to the carnival, "The Fest has fallen short year after year. It is unfortunate. A decade ago the fest used to be amazing. But now it's nothing more than food trucks with some random polka band on stage."
• Kathy Jeno said, "they should combine them, and then it would make one happy town."
• Leah Schroetter told us she's trying to take advantage of everything this year, "With covid canceling everything last year, bring on all the activities!"
• Amber Rose thinks the city can support both, " Yes it's big enough for both."

What do you think? Is Rochester big enough to support multiple events at one time? Open our app and tap the chat button to share your opinion.