There will be limits to the number of people allowed in some city parks to ensure social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Thursday.
“We’ve got some parks, just the way that they’re set up, it’s just too easy to have crowding. We can’t let that happen and we have to limit the number of people going in,” de Blasio said during his daily coronavirus briefing at City Hall.
The mayor said he would announce specifics on the plan Friday.
“It’s not that many places honestly but wherever that is the case were going to work with a protocol to do that. It will take some experimentation, it will take some effort to make sure it works but I think it’s a good direction,” de Blasio said.
Earlier Thursday, Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said on Twitter the department was considering “limiting the amount of people that can go into certain parks.”
“The commissioner and I have had extensive conversations with members of both our teams and other agencies as well and there are certain parks where just the configuration of the park lends itself to overcrowding and we’re working on strategies right now to address that,” de Blasio said during his briefing.
The NYPD dished out dozens of summonses for lax social-distancing in city parks last weekend. Last month Central Park had received the most 311 complaints about overcrowding.
