Dimming street lights?

[Dave Liquorice]

At least you can find them on a website now (if you can be bothered to look). No more negotiation of missing stairs, signs saying "Beware of the Tiger" and locked filing cabinets. B-)

[damduck-egg]

illuminates very well.

Wonder if MHM is screaming from the ceiling yet.

I don't actually have a Bicycle, just the lamp.

G.Harman

[Steve Firth]

Mark wrote: [snip]

Oh FFS isn't it time you townies stopped being scared of the dark? It 's bloody miles from my home to the nearest streetlight. Crime is low, vehicle collisions at night are rare. The significant crash hazard is during daylight hours.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Street lighting is hardly ever tungsten - the home type where dimming isn't very efficient. Dimming tungsten does save *some* energy - but not as much as replacing the bulb with a smaller one of the 'dimmed' output. This is because the efficiency of a dimmed tungsten goes down dramatically.

Street lighting is usually discharge. Similar to modern car headlights.

[Andrew May]

It was a leopard wasn't it?

[John Williamson]

You obviously don't live somewhere urban, then. Conditions are different.

I used to live in a village where I didn't bother checking too enthusiastically that the door had locked if I went out shopping for the day. Here, in the middle of a city, I check the door is locked if I nip out to the shop next door.

In the village, about a dozen cars passed my house in an evening, here there are hundreds each night, with the same traffic levels at one in the morning as at one in the afternoon. The accident rate at night is worse, as the drivers are more likely to be drunk, and there are enough of them about that a collision is more likely. I'd guess that where you live, it's unlikely there is more than one car in sight at any one time, so it's a bit hard to collide with a moving vehicle.

There were no streetlights in the village. There are here. So, maybe if we get rid of the streetlights, all the criminals will move away. And the drunks will stop driving round at night.

Yeah, right....

[dennis]

My 5D cell one isn't so I don't see how a 3 cell one is.

They are out looking to B&E.

[Andy Burns]

I have, though I will admit, not for several years. The thing is most people are accustomed to having streetlights and they ride/drive/walk accordingly.

The stretch in particular I first noticed has a physically separated cycleway, but bikes often avoid using it (either due to the hassle of rejoining the main road a the end of it, or the amount of horseshit on it due to it be used as if it were a bridleway) and we all know that bikes don't need lights, so cars approaching at 40mph (or higher the limit) and finding an unlit bike on a previously lit stretch of road, doesn't seem like progress to me.

Especially when the council claim to be saving nearly £1 per council tax payer per year from this, I'd happily pay more than that to keep them on, but they didn't ask! I suspect insurance bills will go up more than £1 ...

There's lots of residential on-street parking here, most don't bother parking facing the "right" way because the streetlights are on at the time they actually park, not thinking that they'll be parked illegally once the lights go off.

[dennis]

A untapped revenue stream, better phone the council so they can have someone go around and issue tickets.

BTW its illegal to park the wrong way around with the street lights *on*. Its illegal to park without parking lights (that requires two lights at the front and two at the rear not the ones you get when you flip the indicators to the park position) when there are no street lights so there is potential for even more revenue. Of course with all the car parking lights on then you won't need street lights anyway.

[John Williamson]

And the breakdown services will make a fortune, coming out to all the flat batteries every morning. Emitting rather more CO2 than is saved by turning the lights off in the first place.

[Andy Burns]

I'm not likely to do that, but I'm surprised someone hasn't suggested a graveyard shift of wardens.

Not according to the highway code, I checked when I noticed the lighting changes ...

"You MUST NOT park on a road at night facing against the direction of the traffic flow unless in a recognised parking space."

"All vehicles MUST display parking lights when parked on a road or a lay-by on a road with a speed limit greater than 30 mph"

I'm sure there's plenty of scope for you to claim those are weasel words and to remind us that the HC isn't the law, so feel free.

[Terry Casey]

Well our local council is on to that! It was never the best for finding information but, since a much publicised re-vamp a couple of years ago, it is well nigh impossible to find out anything!

Sometimes, when someone posts a link on a local forum to some vital document or another, I've tried to find it using the search facilty using every combination of search terms possible, but to no avail.

Yet I know, because I've got the link, that it IS there - it's just very well hidden ...!

[Andy Burns]

Damn, I should have read your message properly, I thought you said car lights rather than street lights, I'll concede that the quote I posted supports what you said, not what I said!

[John Williamson]

Can't afford the overtime, guv'nor.

When the HC uses the words "MUST" or "MUST NOT", it refers to a legal requirement, with a reference to the applying law being given. It says so in the introduction.

[Jethro]

Surely half the problem is the myriad ways that street lamps are controlled ? I know some authorities fitted light-sensors to street lamps (I vaguely recalled some had one sensor for X lamps), whilst others (like mine) kept/fitted timers (always amusing after a power cut). If they're going to start changing the "on" rules, it could prove very costly. Ideally it'd be nice to control every light individually - then they could switch to "half lights", or vary the times for economy. Presumably those lights that are on less will need replacing less, leading to savings in bulbs ?

Mind you, this falls into my "if it *really* mattered" test ... similar to being able to control *all* traffic signals (INCLUDING pedestrian lights). I'm sure if some enlightened local authority did this, they could improve the efficiency of the road network (i.e. reduce the need for new roads) by a considerable amount. Unfortunately the dogma that we mustn't do anything that remotely looks like helping motorists wins out. Better be careful, straying into urd territory.

Anyway, on topic, to be honest, I can't see that switching/dimming lights between (say) midnight and 4am would affect a great number of people.

[Mark]

Yes.

[dennis]

So you can't park the wrong way around if its on the road and not in a parking space. A parking space is a defined area and not some arbitrary place on the road.

That is true, even if there are street lights you can't park without parking lights if the speed limit is above 30 mph. There are other restrictions that require you to use parking lights that you appear to have missed, like close to a junction.

Its common sense really, the car has reflectors at the rear so the rear must be illuminated by the headlights of the cars. Its also why lights are required at junctions as the headlights of the approaching car won't be reflected properly.

Its because drivers are pretty stupid that they have to make it a law in the first place, they can't think for themselves so need rules.

They are not weasel words and are true, you may have interpreted them incorrectly.

[dennis]

Sorry I posted the reply before I got here.

[Owain]

That must have been a disappointing Xmas Day.

Owain

[Tim Streater]

Does "display" mean they have to be on? And this quote appears to be the case all day, not just at night.

When did you last see a car with sidelights on when parked at night?