Sometimes you just need a charge, y'know? So why wait to get home when you can always steal your juice from the city! Back in the day you used to sometimes see less fortunate (or simply thrifty) New Yorkers hacking into lamp posts for power, but we'd never seen someone doing it for their cellphone until EV Grieve posted a picture of a woman doing just that. Needless to say, the city is not amused.
In fact, the Department of Transportation is very adamant that you shouldn't go and tap their power, and not just because they are cheap. "Streetlights have a tamper-proof door," DOT spokesman Nicholas Mosquera told the Post. "Even if someone were able to open one, there are no outlets inside for ... phone chargers." Plus, if they DO get in and DO get power, leaving the wires loose ups the chances stray voltage going out, which can be deadly for people and animals.
Still, though the city claims there are no outlets in those lampposts, sometimes there really are—as you can see at the 3:20 mark in this classic video. At least our power-hungry hipsters aren't taking sledgehammers to lampposts to get their electric fix? Yet...
