The traditional New Year’s Eve in New York’s Times Square is “drasically scaled back”. Mayor Bill de Blasio, who announced last month that the event could continue unlike last year, made that decision due to the “staggering” number of new corona infections.
The maximum number of visitors to Times Square on New Year’s Eve will be reduced from 58,000 to 15,000 and everyone must be fully vaccinated and wear a mask, the mayor announced. These additional measures will allow “the vaccinated crowd to ring in the new year in a safe way,” De Blasio said.
Times Square was mostly empty on New Year’s Eve last year. Only a few hundred aid workers and their families were invited as a tribute. This year, De Blasio hoped for a “big party, full of life,” he said last month.
Hundreds of thousands of people normally gather in the square to watch the ‘ball drop’, where a time ball on a flagpole descends 43 meters to herald the new year.
Mayors of other world cities such as London and Paris already decided to largely cancel New Year’s festivities.
–
