The Danish capital was bustling with colour, dance and joy on Saturday as a record-sized Copenhagen Pride parade made its way across the city.
An estimated 40,000 people took part in the parade itself – considerably up from the 25,000 last year – which had to stop accepting participants at some point because of space issues.
Some 180 groups brought a float of some sort and Thomas Rasmussen, the head of communications for CPH Pride, confirmed that the parade, which celebrates sexual minorities, was the longest ever.
A long line of organisations, companies, political parties, unions and private groups took part in the parade, which began at Frederiksberg City Hall and moved 3.3 km to Copenhagen City Hall Square.
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Trash and toilet turmoil
But while the surge in interest in the parade was surely a positive note to most, there were challenges involved with hosting so many people.
Copenhagen Pride pays the city 130,000 kroner to clean up the parade route, but a day later there was still rubbish strewn about in various places along the roads.
Another issue was the shortage of toilets along the route – Copenhagen Pride had put toilets up along Frederiksberg Allé and public toilets were open at Vesterbro Torv, but it was not enough.
“Yesterday, the parade was so long that they had to send their cleaning workers home. The cleaners met at 06:00 in the morning [on Sunday] and started cleaning,” Jesper Sørensen, CPH Pride’s head of parade issues, told TV2 Lorry.
“We definitely need to look at the toilets next year. In co-operation with the police and municipality, we will evaluate how to make it better, because there is no doubt we want everyone to be happy, including those people who live along the route.”
