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UPDATE JUNE 18, 2020: Mayor Bill de Blasio announced during his press conference that playgrounds will reopen on Monday, June 22.
UPDATE JUNE 17, 2020: After complaints and attempts from residents to break into NYC playgrounds, Mayor Bill de Blasio insists that they must remain closed until Phase 2. According to his June 16 press briefing, he said, "Right now, we're not going to make a change with the playgrounds until we get to phase two. Now, phase two as everyone knows, could be as early as June 22nd. I've said, I think it's going to take a little longer than that just to make sure we're absolutely certain, but until the order is given the playgrounds are open; people need to stay off the playgrounds, it's not appropriate to take their own action."
Perhaps there's some hope for summer 2020 after all.
Mayor Bill de Blasio revealed that NYC could quite possibly open its public pools this season—a plan that was originally squashed back in April. Additionally, Governor Andrew Cuomo has given the green light for localities to reopen playgrounds provided they use discretion and their region's health data as a guide.
Each locality will determine when public pools and playgrounds will open in their region.
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) June 11, 2020
They must use health data & metrics as a guide to inform each decision.
However, NYC playgrounds still remain closed as of June 12. Time Out New York Kids reached out to the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation for its reopening plans, but did not hear back at the time of publication. During his June 11 press meeting, Mayor de Blasio did mention that playgrounds will reopen eventually, but unfortunately NYC is not quite there yet.
"I want nothing more than to get them back to those playgrounds, it was one of the areas where I really tried my best to keep the playgrounds open," he said on June 11. "And if it hadn't been for the growth of the pandemic we would have, but we had to, at the time, this is something we worked on with the State, we had to get to the point of saying, look, out of abundance of caution, the playgrounds just created too much of a risk to families of the spread of the disease. The day is coming, it's not here yet, but the day is coming we'll be able to open up them again."
In the meantime, parks remain open, though some of their facilities are not. If you're craving time outdoors, check out these family-friendly bike paths and hiking trails.
Check back often, as we will provide updates about NYC playgrounds when they do reopen.
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