This is unusual, but I would be willing to bet some of you have more expiriance GMing then me, so I may often ask your opinions.
With as many people as we have, should I allow two characters per person or will that be too much?
In my experience I've found that when people are allowed to play multiple characters they generally only do so when they're confident in their ability to handle it. I think that if you decide to split the players up into multiple groups then this would prove a satisfactory way to allow them to play multiple sides of the story. If you plan on keeping everyone together as a single party then I think playing multiple characters would be a bit extraneous as they're not really adding much from the player's perspective other than additional writing opportunities / increased work load.