A number of high profile movies have been shot in the DUMBO – Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass – neighbourhood in recent months, including New Year’s Eve, with Robert De Niro, Hilary Swank and Sarah Jessica Parker, and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, featuring Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock.
Residents have now lodged official complaints about the shoots, accusing film crews of hogging parking spots and restricting access to the roads around the area.
Gus Sheha of the DUMBO Neighborhood Foundation, tells the New York Post, “It’s impossible to find a parking spot these days, between the streets being ripped up and all the filming.”
Doreen Gallo, who leads the DUMBO Neighborhood Alliance, adds, ” Residents love that their neighbourhood is filmed, but they just don’t seem to like it when it’s actually going on.”
Gallo’s group has filed an official request with the Mayor’s Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting asking staff to limit the number of future production shoots in the neighbourhood.
A city spokeswoman tells the publication that “rest periods for streets within neighbourhoods are determined on a case-by-case basis” and “part of DUMBO is currently undergoing a rest period”.
