Dyker Heights Christmas lights a holiday hit with New Yorkers

DYKER HEIGHTS, Brooklyn (PIX11) -- As the Christmas season gets underway one Brooklyn neighborhood has transformed into a winter wonderland, solidifying its place as one of New York’s must-see attractions during the holiday season. 

Several blocks of Dyker Heights are lined with homes adorned with the most extravagant Christmas lights and decorations, helping people from all over get in the Christmas spirit. Anthony Amato came from New Jersey to see the lights hoping to start a new tradition with his wife and children.

“I used to come here with my family now I’m coming here with my own family so it’s a big deal,” Amato said. 

Every year the spectacle brings crowds of people who stroll through the streets, and even food vendors. 

“We come here, eat a lot, walk around, eat more,” said spectator Howie Dinowitz. 

The tradition of bedazzling homes with life-sized snowmen was started by Lucy Spata and her husband back in 1986 after moving to the neighborhood and noticing the lack of holiday decorations in the area. She says that after her husband and mom passed away, she made a promise to keep the tradition going in their honor. 

“My husband passed on four years ago and he made me promise I would never ever stop decorating, and I said the same thing if something happened to me first, and now it’s just going to go on, and then it’ll go on in his memory and my mother‘s memory,” Spata said. 

Deanna Finerty has been coming to see the lights since she was a kid and says the tradition has changed over the years with the overflow of tourists congesting the neighborhood for several blocks.

“It was never like that,” Finerty said. “Never ever. Not even people walking around so much because more people would drive around. Now it’s the tourists, it’s the walking, it’s the driving, it’s everything.”

But the heavy foot traffic is not enough to keep spectators like Shana Blake from getting in on the magic of the season year after year. “I like coming here because we get to spend time with the family and we get to go out for ice cream every year,” said Blake.