In the wake of the Berlin truck attack, police departments around the U.S. are making a show of force at places where crowds gather at Christmastime.
(FOX)- In New York City, police dispatched heavily-armed counterterrorism officers to stand guard at crowded pop-up Christmas markets in Union Square, Bryant Park and Columbus Circle only an hour after news broke Tuesday about the carnage in Berlin, where a stolen truck slammed into a crowd and killed 12 people.
The police department also has a program to encourage truck rental companies to report any suspicious interactions with people wanting to rent vehicles that might be used in an attack.
Mayor Bill de Blasio called the precautions “a very sad reality.”
In Chicago, police parked their vehicles diagonally at the corners of Daley Plaza to block any vehicle access to a Christmas market there. In San Francisco, motorcycle and mounted horse units will were patrolling in high-traffic shopping areas.
Big cities have been fortifying sidewalks since the Sept. 11 attacks, installing bollards and concrete planters designed to prevent vehicles from driving into pedestrians or the side of a building. Parts of Times Square and a two-block stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House have been closed to traffic for years, partly as a precaution against car bombs.
A recent posting in an English-language Islamic State magazine called this year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade “an excellent target” for a truck attack. That caused enough concern that police used dozens of sand-filled dump trucks to block streets along the parade route.