ATLANTA -- When Mayor Shirley Franklin spoke at the station's closing ceremony on Monday the audience began throwing questions at the Mayor.

The historic fire station in West Atlanta was closed on Monday, but residents rallying to keep it open demanded answers from Franklin.

One reason why people in the neighborhood were so upset was that they were already in the process of raising money to restore the 100-year-old fire house.

Residents also said that they feared for their safety. One resident, Pamela Perkins, said that she felt a special connection to Fire Station 7 because of a time when her mother was rescued by the firefighters when she was having complications after surgery.

“They were able to stabilize her and get her to the hospital,” Perkins said. “The fire department was there in a matter of a couple of minutes." Mayor Shirley Franklin ordered the fire station to close to help the city’s budget. Firefighters from the station will be transferred to other stations in the city, but some will be demoted in the process.

One West End resident, John Pavlin, said he was worried.

“I'm worried about my neighbors. I'm worried about the businesses. This is the oldest neighborhood in the city,” said Pavlin.

"For them to say that response time is not going to be affected is hard for me to believe," he said.

"We have a ton of seniors around here, so I don't know what we're going to do without a fire department here."

Firefighters had to to move out all of their trucks and their gear before the closing ceremony.