CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- A rusted-out city light pole came crashing to the ground Thursday in the Humboldt Park neighborhood - and it was not the first time something like this happened. Some residents say the city needs to get on this problem.
The latest incident happened at Campbell Avenue and Rice Street in Humboldt Park on Thursday afternoon. The pole came down feet from a crosswalk near a school.
“I looked off the balcony and I seen the blues from the copper, and so I went on the balcony. I seen the lamppost fall over and it was busted into the street,” Bob Kurek told CBS 2.
“Thank God that a car wasn’t coming down the street when that thing feel over. It would have killed somebody. Thank God the kids were still in school, not crossing going home.”
Kurek has lived at Campbell and Rice for more than 50 years and is an alumnus of the Frederic Chopin Elementary School across the street at 2450 W. Rice St.
He said the rusted-out light pole that fell into the street just before 1 p.m. Thursday afternoon narrowly missed the car parked nearby, but it’s not parked cars he’s worried about.
“I know if anything happened to my family crossing the street or driving down the street, and that would fall on it, I’d be in a different of mood than I am right now,” Kurek said, “and it wouldn’t be a pretty one.”
And he is not alone in that concern.
“Thank god no kids were around,” said parent Karen Ramos, who's daughter goes to Chopin Elementary. “It’s really scary. I just hope Chicago city does get to fix this problem.”
The bottom on the light pole was rusted out - the same issue that has caused other aging poles to come down. There were at least three incidents in which lamp posts fell in November.
On Wednesday, Nov. 27 amid high winds, pole fell right across the southbound express lanes of Lake Shore Drive near Goethe Street in the Gold Coast. Three lanes of the southbound Outer Drive had to be closed.
Less than a week earlier on Thursday, Nov. 21, a light pole came crashing down right outside the Thompson Center in the Loop, and hit a woman who was walking down LaSalle Street; and just over a week before that, a city traffic light pole snapped and fell onto a sport-utility vehicle on Stony Island Avenue at 73rd Street.
"Chicago needs to get their inspectors together and start getting out and checking all these things," Kurek said.
CBS 2 has been reporting on this issue for years, finding hundreds of dangerous light poles and some injuries.