Some of Manhattan’s northernmost neighborhoods have New York City’s highest concentration of calls to 311 about fireworks, a Gothamist analysis of city data has found.
Parts of Washington Heights, Inwood and Harlem have all reported outsize shares of complaints since at least 2021, the analysis shows. Other hotspots include Brooklyn’s Gravesend and Flatbush neighborhoods; Annandale on Staten Island; Highbridge in the Bronx and Jackson Heights in Queens.
Gothamist used four years’ worth of 311 service calls from the city’s Open Data portal and grouped them by Census tract for the analysis. Check out the map below to see how your neighborhood measures up:
The cracks and whistles of street fireworks are part of the city’s summer soundscape, but some New Yorkers say they hate them for the air and noise pollution they create. They can also be dangerous: Fireworks have burned and maimed both their purchasers and innocent bystanders. They’ve also destroyed at least one apartment in Inwood.
The map shows complaints about fireworks, not fireworks themselves, so it may be more of a map of haters than amateur pyrotechnicians. But calls to 311 did track with skyrocketing rates of amateur fireworks shows in the summer of 2020. In June and July of that year, cooped-up New Yorkers sent the hotline more than 47,000 fireworks-related complaints, according to the data analyzed by Gothamist. That’s 60 times the number of complaints received the year before. The spike prompted city officials to crack down on vendors selling the illegal fireworks.
New Yorkers are still complaining at higher rates than before the pandemic lockdown, but they haven’t come close to 2020’s 311 submission spree. They filed around 18,000 complaints in the summer of 2021, and about 7,000 each in 2022 and 2023.
Gothamist purposefully excluded the strange summer of 2020 from its analysis. Even so, Inwood stood out. The Census tracts abutting Dyckman Street each boasted hundreds of fireworks-related complaints since 2021, Gothamist found. One stretch running between Dyckman and West 204th streets from Nagle Avenue to Broadway racked up more than 400 complaints – the second-highest number of any tract citywide.
Jay Fernandez, a lifelong Inwood resident, said he was unsurprised by the news. July 4 means “music, people, family, fireworks everywhere,” he said.
On a recent weekday morning, though, Dyckman Street and its surroundings were downright tranquil, save for the occasional sirens and cars with modified mufflers.
Jasmine Mahboob, who was walking her puppy Remy in nearby Fort Tryon Park, said that this summer has been sleepy compared to past ones. She said that when fireworks are used safely, they’re a part of the neighborhood’s summer soundtrack, alongside music and parties. But she was clear-eyed about the potential dangers of irresponsibly deployed fireworks, recalling that a barrage of fireworks caused an apartment fire in 2020 that displaced a woman and her daughter.
“As much as I appreciate that they are a celebration, let’s keep it safe, let’s keep it limited,” she said. ”Make sure that everybody has a good time and gets to sleep.”
Remy, a four-month-old French bulldog, has been unbothered by the fireworks he’s heard so far, Mahboob added, as the pup sniffed a Gothamist reporter’s microphone. So she’s not too worried about the Independence Day onslaught.
“He’s really good with thunder and lightning, so fingers crossed, we’re gonna be OK,” she said.