THE last piece of an unsafe 150-metre high crane which caused traffic chaos across Birmingham City Centre has been finally taken down.

A portable crane was set up in Park Street to remove the structure which caused the alert at a construction site just off Moor Street, on Thursday morning.

A major emergency operation was launched involving police, the fire service, ambulance crews, the city council and Network Rail.

Cordons were put in place while engineers assessed the crane.

A West Midlands Police spokesman said: “Specialists conducting a routine check of the site identified a potential problem with the concrete foundations which fix the crane to the floor.

“As a precautionary measure, they took the decision to alert police and evacuate the site.”

Park Street was due to be reopened last night after the final piece of crane was taken down shortly before 3.30pm yesterday.