They used to sit on so many city street corners, these red cylinder-like posts with an inside compartment for calling the fire department. In a pre-iPhone era, this was how New Yorkers let the FDNY know they were needed to put out a fire.
Over the years, the style has changed—but I’m specifically talking about these torch-topped beauties, more pale pink in color, with early 20th century ornamentation on what’s basically a piece of street furniture.
I’m not sure how many are still on city curbs. I spotted this one at First Avenue and 58th Street, and it felt like a relic from another era, defaced with stickers and graffiti.
As of a few years ago, approximately 15,000 street fire alarms of all kinds remained on city streets, reported Crain’s New York Business in 2017.
“The boxes were used 11,440 times to call the Fire Department last year,” wrote Crain’s. “That is less than once per box, on average.”
“Only 13% of those calls were for actual emergencies, and less than 1.5%, or 167, were about fires, including just 10 for serious structural fires.”
No surprise, the city would like to get rid of them—and both the Giuliani and Bloomberg administrations failed to do so, after an organization that advocated for the deaf sued the city to keep the alarms.
They won’t last forever, felled by either city administrators or new construction.
Take a moment to admire their artistry, and that these once-ubiquitous artifacts served a noble purpose.
Tags: FDNY Street Fire Alarms, Fire Alarms New York City, Fire Alarms Street, Red Fire Alarm Posts NYC
Ephemeral New York 
April 29, 2019 at 9:52 am |
[…] Source: FS – NYC Real Estate The red fire alarm relics on New York streets […]
April 29, 2019 at 10:09 am |
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May 3, 2019 at 3:11 pm |
This means 87% (!) of the calls were false alarms that diverted firefighters from real emergencies, on top of the annual waste by the City of $7 million to paint and repair these boxes.
May 5, 2019 at 3:34 pm |
They used to be bright red—”fire engine red”—but the sunlight has bleached them to the current pink. The fact is they do NOT get painted, hence their current state of dilapidation.
May 5, 2019 at 5:20 pm |
I never thought of that Andrew, good point about the faded pink color.
June 15, 2019 at 12:41 am |
There’s a survivor in the New York Transit Museum, along with other street furniture, as part of their buses and trolleys exhibit.
December 3, 2019 at 9:47 pm |
There is also another survivor in the New York State Museum in Albany (ca. 1900). It seems like Boston and D.C. have taken better care of their still-standing fire alarm boxes and lamp posts.
January 9, 2023 at 4:09 pm |
This week one of these beauties was knocked down by a truck on First & 60th Street. FDNY was here today and we hope they will repair & reinstall.
March 26, 2023 at 5:56 pm |
Likely it won’t be repaired, but replaced by a light post mounted box, especially if the post was broken in any way.
March 26, 2023 at 7:28 pm |
RD Wolff: You’re right. They replaced it with a new alarm box. The fdny men who removed it said it could be repaired but unfortunately they didn’t.
March 26, 2023 at 11:25 pm |
Sad Susan, but the city has been pushing getting rid of all of them. There’s still a lot of them in Brooklyn, but almost none of the boxes in the city or at least Manhattan still have their original doors and mechanical guts. I own a complete one from Bthe Bronx that I restored, it had the 1970s police/fire intercom, but I acquired an original turn handle door that came from Brooklyn, and mechanical box to do the restoration.