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It’s Friday. We have a festival-filled weekend ahead, featuring film, Fluff and pizza. But first, let’s go over the local news:

Zoning in: After passing a “landmark” rezoning plan last year, Cambridge is eyeing some tweaks to the new code. City councilors voted in February 2025 to eliminate single-family zoning and allow by-right construction of buildings of at least four stories across all of Cambridge. The change was intended to encourage more multi-family housing and address a supply shortage that has driven up prices. And so far, officials say it’s working. But this week, the council advanced a couple proposals to fine-tune the sweeping overhaul.

• Larger setbacks: One proposal moving forward would increase setbacks — aka the minimum distance required between a building and a property line. The relaxed code passed in 2025 generally requires at least a 5-foot setback on the rear and sides of a building, and at least 10 feet in front. However, officials said those minimums weren’t always leaving enough room for building code requirements for things like stormwater, electrical equipment, entrances and protections for existing trees — which created confusion for developers. The new proposal would increase the required setbacks on the sides to a combined 15 feet, and at least 25 feet combined for the front and rear. “On these small sites, even just a few feet can make a big difference,” Jen Caira, the city’s deputy chief of planning, said Wednesday.
• Tighter design standards: According to Caira, there have been “a few” instances of developers taking advantage of the loosened height rules to put up “a new, larger building” without increasing the number of units. For example, “a two-family is taken down and a new two-family is built, but with much bigger units,” she said. To address that issue, the city is considering three-story limits for buildings with individual units that are bigger than a certain size (1,600 to 2,000 gross square feet) or increasing the setbacks for those projects.
• The big picture: Cambridge officials said the proposed changes would still be more permissive than the pre-2025 zoning code. And they said the new code has worked the way it was intended over the last 18 months. “We are seeing more multi-family housing,” Caira said. “We’re seeing fewer down conversions where an existing two- or three-family may be converted to a single family. And while the larger inclusionary housing projects take some more time to get going, we are seeing those being proposed and moving into construction.”
• What’s next: The changes don’t take effect quite yet. The full City Council is expected to vote on the proposals at its next meeting on Sept. 28.

Clean up, clean up: Massachusetts is seeking volunteers for dozens of beach cleanups over the next two months. The state’s Office of Coastal Zone Management kicks off the annual waterfront trash pickups this weekend. Check out the full list — or the map! — of cleanup events to register to pitch in.

• By the numbers: Over the last two decades, the state says volunteers have collected nearly 1.5 millions pounds of trash from local beaches, rivers and lakes. They’ve typically gotten over 3,000 volunteers a season.
• Zoom out: Robin Lacey, the coordinator for the cleanups, told WBUR’s John Bender the events also help officials understand what kinds of trash end up on local beaches. “We can get a sense of what is being found on the beach each year. And this goes into a worldwide database that helps to find ways to reduce the marine debris problem,” Lacey said.

Heads up: The MBTA’s entire Needham commuter rail line will be out of service this weekend, due to a bridge replacement project in West Roxbury. And there are no free shuttle buses coming to save us. (The shuttles are busy with the tangle of Green Line and Red Line closures also descending on Boston this weekend.)

• If you’re trying to get between Boston and Needham on public transit, T officials recommend using some combination of local buses and the Green Line or Orange Line. We’ll let this graphic explain.

P.S.— Which bus route was named the MBTA’s slowest in this year’s Pokey-Schleppie Awards? Take our Boston News Quiz and see how well you know the stories we covered this week compared to other WBUR readers.