Chicago FD Administrative Order A-02-21

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Tags: Chicago FD Administrative Order A-02-21, Chicago FD relocates Paramedic Field Chief 4-5-6

This entry was posted on March 7, 2021, 11:00 AM and is filed under Fire Department News. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

7 Comments

#1 by Bill Post on March 10, 2021 - 5:37 PM

Mike, 4-5-9 is with Engine 46 on the southeast side. You know that the district chief and Deputy District 5 from Engine 81 were moved to Engine 115’s new station which is not far from the city limits. So District 5 is really on the district’s edge. The CFD, which did an in-house study in the 1980s, felt that Engine 93 should have a new house at 103rd and State Street with a new truck company. That location would make more sense for the District 5 headquarters and is a little more centrally located in the district.
#2 by Mike on March 10, 2021 - 5:13 PM

Where is 4-5-9 located? Are they relatively close to the new home of 4-5-6.
#3 by Bill Post on March 10, 2021 - 3:20 AM

Yes Danny the large crews at O’Hare seem to be doing fine.

I would say the main crux of the point that I have been trying to make is really that the fire department itself did a detailed report on the need for fire company relocations needed on the far south side, and the study had given specific locations where they felt new fire stations should be built or relocated. The report was so specific that it even recommended certain engine companies be taken out of service to create new truck companies with the manpower from those engines. It listed four specific fire station recommendations in order of their priority.

The first recommended station that to be built was for Engine 75 at or near 13000 south and 200 east which is 130th and Indiana. It also had recommended that Engine 63 be taken out of service and they would have created a new truck company with the manpower.
Engine 100 would have remained in service instead of Engine 63.

The second recommended fire station was for Engine 97 at 13000 south and 3100 east which would have been at Houston and 130th street. A new truck company would have been created by taking Engine 20 out of service, and that truck would have been located with Engine 97 in their new house.

The third new station would have been built at 103rd near State Street for Engine 93 and another new truck company.

The fourth new station was recommended to be put at approximately 732 west on 115th Street. Truck 24 was slated to be relocated there with Engine 104 that was still downtown. Instead Engine 103 had been recommended to be relocated to Truck 61’s house. Well we know that it didn’t happen and 104 was moved to Truck 61 instead of 103.

Truck 24 just moved in with Engine 115 in their new station that is less than a mile from the original recommended location for Truck 24, but as you know Engine 115 was in desperate need of a new station. They had one of the oldest stations in Chicago.

So it’s not really an issue that a new station was built for Engine 115 and Truck 24 as both companies needed new quarters, however according to the in-house study, Engines 75, 97, and 103 also needed, and in my opinion still need new stations.

This study was done by the fire department’s Research and Planning Department was basing the need for fire company relocations on “demand zones” that were realized. Most of the relocations would have decreased the response time to these inadequately covered areas. These recommended new fire stations were not rumors but specific recommendations by the fire department’s research and planning people. Most likely it was politics that got in the way. As you know in Chicago, politics comes first and actual need usually comes last.

My issue is not a new station for Engine 115, which was recommended for replacement in the 1960’s Maatman reports, my issue is that those other three proposed stations should also be built instead of one extra large station.
#4 by danny on March 10, 2021 - 1:54 AM

bill to my knowledge the firehouse at o’hare has 23 – 25 guys on duty each shift and has not had any issues or changes in how things are in a house with that many members. if someone knows something different i would be interested in knowing how things are different.

i know years ago a rumor went around that there were gonna be 2 houses out that way and the rumor was E 115 and a new truck company in a house and the other house would combine E 75 and T 24.
#5 by Chuck on March 9, 2021 - 8:22 AM

I wanna be the cook in this house. 22 guys (and girls?) in the club every day for meals? I’ll have a new car in no time.
#6 by Bill Post on March 8, 2021 - 1:40 AM

In my previous commentary I was not saying that a 24 hour SCBA order is about to a happen, but given the foolishness of Chicago’s leadership I could see it happening. The new station has been a very long time in coming. It was originally recommended to be built in the 1960s by a consultant. A lot of money was wasted which could have been used for building several other stations proposed for both the 22nd and 24th Battalions by the fire department’s own Research and Planning unit during the 1980s.
#7 by Bill Post on March 7, 2021 - 10:28 PM

So now they are having a Paramedic Field Chief move in with Deputy District 5 and District 5 in addition to the rest of the gang which includes two ambulances, two engines, and a newly designated tower ladder.

Another prime example of the City of Chicago massively overbuilding a fire station. The size of the new station is also making the mayor look foolish as it will be impossible to maintain social distance there. Did you know that if someone in the station gets COVID more than half of the 22nd Battalion will be taken out of service? They are going to issue a general order that all personnel assigned to the new station will be required to wear their SCBAs for the entire 24 hours while on duty.

You will also notice that most of the battalion’s ambulances will be on the west dnd of the battalion. While the new house will have Ambulances 76 and 5 plus 456, Engine 62, which gets plenty of EMS calls in the eastern of part of Roseland and Pullman will have no ambulance assigned to their house despite the fact that Ambulance 5 was there for 17 years.

Some of you may know that many fire stations adopt a nickname. In Brooklyn, New York Engine 277 and Ladder 112 are in the “House of Pain” and the same goes for Engine 10 and Ladder 13 in Washington DC. As the new house at 1024 W 119th is going to be over crowded, I would like to suggest that it be called the “House of Congestion”. It will be in honor of the mayor’s big ego.