And while Mr. de Blasio’s announcement made his directives sound like faits accomplis, under city law they are only recommendations that must be developed into formal proposals that will be considered by the Public Design Commission, a panel tasked with making determinations about public monuments and artwork. The mayor appoints a majority of the design commission’s members.

“I think Columbus did some things that were deeply troubling,” Mr. de Blasio said on Friday in an interview on WNYC radio. “But Columbus long ago, a century or more ago, became wrapped up in the larger history of Italian-American people.”

He said that connection could not be “unwrapped,” adding that New York has “one of the biggest Italian-American populations in the whole country. And I think that has to be respected and honored too.” Mr. de Blasio is of Italian and German descent.

He said that comparisons of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general whose statue was the focus of the riot in Charlottesville, to Columbus, whose voyages triggered an era of colonialism that led to the brutal exploitation of Native Americans and the destruction of their cultures, were “apples and oranges.”

Mr. de Blasio did not make himself available to reporters on Friday and later in the day he left for a trip to Boston and Maine.

Richard Alba, a commission member, said the Columbus statue was an “acid test” for the panel because “you had directly opposing meanings brought to the statue by different groups of people.” The commission also recommended that the statue remain but that explanatory material be added.