Where to Trick-or-Treat in NYC: Blocks Locals Swear By

With October 31 just days away, the city’s trick-or-treat strategists are already plotting their routes. According to a Curbed report by writer Fiorella Valdesolo, who canvassed local parents and Halloween diehards, the best nights out depend on knowing which blocks go big, which ones go quiet, and where a little patience pays off in candy.

In Queens, Burns Street in the Gardens area of Forest Hills offers a storybook backdrop of Tudor-style houses with a European-village feel. The catch, Queens-based editor Erica Metzger told Curbed, is that it gets crazy crowded. In Manhattan, West 69th Street was described by media executive Carine Vinett as an all-out block party; she recalled one house hiring live acrobats to swing from roof to roof like Spider-Man.

Brooklyn offers several heavyweight contenders. Garden Place in Brooklyn Heights is reliably mayhem, and marketing adviser Ying Chu said a Paul Rudd sighting in past years prompted chants of “Ant-Man!” In Windsor Terrace, Sherman Street is “full-on Halloweentown,” according to beauty-and-skin-care executive Biba Milioto, while nearly every home on 11th Street between Eighth Avenue and Prospect Park West participates. Those houses stage Broadway-style production sets, Milioto said, with a Barbie house a few years back and Jurassic Park last year.

For a smoother haul, the Curbed piece suggests thinking small. Chu recommends side streets near popular thoroughfares, where less traffic can mean more generous candy. Brand consultant Florencia Cavallo pointed to 1st and 2nd Places in Carroll Gardens, and Milioto called 3rd Street in Park Slope nice and wide, a mellower option for younger children. In apartment buildings, some will signal which doors to knock on; Metzger’s Queens building hands candy-giving residents a pumpkin-shaped doorknob hanger. Her advice: be polite to the doorman, who sometimes has a hot tip on the best candy.

Those who prefer their Halloween with a shiver should head to the West Village, where creative director Chelsea Baken said Perry, Charles and West 11th Streets are consistently scary, and the giant spider at Waverly and Christopher is not to be missed. In Carroll Gardens, Cavallo said a house on Henry Street between Carroll and President is so terrifying that some kids have to cross the street. She also pointed to the open coffin at Scotto Funeral Home, at Court Street and 2nd Place, where trick-or-treaters can pull treats, followed by the bloodstained windows and mutilated dolls on President near Hoyt.

Staten Island has its own organized haunt hunters. Locals formed a group called Staten Island Haunted Houses and mapped the borough’s over-the-top displays on a custom Google map. Co-founder Michael LaPayower named 623 Darlington Avenue, where hired actors spook passersby, and the intersection of Heenan and Rathbun Avenues, considered the most decorated corner block on the island.

For families who want a parade with their sweets, consultant Theresa Canning Zast, known locally for her handmade costumes, suggested the Jackson Heights Beautification Group Children’s Halloween Parade, which kicks off at noon on 89th Street, with stores along 37th Avenue opening their doors to trick-or-treaters. In Park Slope, the annual parade runs along Seventh Avenue from 14th Street and ends with a “Monster Mash” sing-along near the Old Stone House at Fifth Avenue and 3rd Street.