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Fourth fireworks are movin’ on back to the East Side

BY SAM SPOKONY  |  The annual Macy’s Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza will come back to the East River this year, Mayor de Blasio and Macy’s officials announced on April 14.

The fireworks display had been held for five straight years on the Hudson River — leaving many in Brooklyn and Queens and on Manhattan’s East Side without a view of the show. De Blasio said he was “thrilled” to bring the fireworks back to the other side of town, even though the shift will reportedly cost the city an extra $500,000 in security costs.

In his former job as the city’s public advocate, de Blasio, a Park Slope, Brooklyn, resident, had long pushed to bring the fireworks back east, citing complaints from outer-borough residents. This year’s show will feature pyrotechnics shot from barges along the southern portion of the East River, as well as some launched from atop the Brooklyn Bridge.

State Senator Daniel Squadron, whose district includes both the Lower East Side and parts of Brooklyn’s waterfront along the river, was among those cheering the announcement.

“This year, New York’s Fourth of July show will now be a celebration more New Yorkers can be part of,” said Squadron. “I’m pleased to have been able to work with Public Advocate de Blasio and, more fruitfully, Mayor de Blasio and Macy’s to bring the fireworks back to the East River. I look forward to enjoying the show with millions more New Yorkers in more boroughs for years to come.”

The Downtown Alliance, which manages the major Manhattan businesses improvement district, or BID, below Chambers St., also praised the move.

“I heartily applaud Mayor de Blasio’s decision to rotate the location of the celebration between the East and Hudson rivers,” said Downtown Alliance President Jessica Lappin, who formerly served as an Upper East Side City Councilmember. “This plan helps bring the pride, and the economic benefits, of our nation’s birthday celebration to more of our city’s neighborhoods.”