Better Streetlights for Tulsa

[patric]

The Chicago area equivalent to INCOG, known as the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning (CMAP), recently voted to add streetlighting and outdoor lighting improvement to their 2040 Vision comprehensive plan.

But they have some familiar hurdles in front of them:  Their big Public Works and public planning firm Christopher B. Burke Engineering reported that they routinely recommend to municipalities that they chose more energy efficient and eye-friendly cutoff or full cutoff lighting, but municipalities are quietly prodded into choosing "Acorn" fixtures instead, saying they like how they look in the day.   

Money-saving arguments, even in bad financial times, dont seem to have much sway when you are spending other people's money.   

(Courtesy Illinois Coalition for Responsible Outdoor Lighting, www.illinoislighting.org)

[PonderInc]

One of the first I saw on a large scale was installed in the historic district of Atoka, of all places.  They are using the clear-glass version of this fixture.

I couldn't get your link to work, but I think you're trying to get us to this pdf...
http://www.aal.net/sections/products/_brochures/promenade.pdf

[Gaspar]

I couldn't get your link to work, but I think you're trying to get us to this pdf...
http://www.aal.net/sections/products/_brochures/promenade.pdf

I LIKE!

[patric]

I LIKE!

That is the fixture they are using in the Historic District in Atoka.

AEP may not like it because you can get a 50-watt fixture to do the work of a 100-watt fixture, but they also know Tulsa will lay off police and firemen before we will cut back on unnecessarily wasteful streetlights.

[patric]

Some regional planning commissions are really into this.

Look at http://www.ccrpcvt.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC={6BB25C93-A3D1-4F34-B4FE-FA0E161E853B}
and click on the link for "Outdoor Lighting Guide for Vermont Municipalities"

It makes you wish INCOG and TMAPC were as enthusiastic.

[PonderInc]

I heard a rumor that the Kaiser Foundation might be considering funding a downtown "landscaping and lighting master plan."  I don't know who would be consulted on this, but I can only hope that environmentally friendly, energy efficient, NON-GLARE BOMB, aesthetically pleasing light fixtures would be recommended in such a plan.

Which is to say: Please, please, please...let's put an end to this absurd acorn-mania!

[patric]

Anyone catch this in the Tulsa Whirled Sunday?

County Commissioner Terry Simonson intends to:
"Convert county street lights to LED lights: The county has about 363 light fixtures that are targeted for replacement with 100-watt LED fixtures, a plan that would cost about $400,000 and save far more than that over time."

If he's replacing 400-watt glarebombs with 100-watt LED's (and that much light is actually needed) then it could be interesting, but if he's stuck in a loop with AEP demanding fixtures must burn a minimum of 100 Watts to be on the "approved list" then we have a problem.

If you've ever had a 1-watt LED light in your face you know how bright that is.  Imagine 100 of those.
If he's on an energy conservation kick, just switching to LED's isnt really thinking out of the box that much if we arent also re-evaluating those things that are wastefully lit now.

Keeping glare and stray light in check would be a plus even for non-LED lights.  Cut out the spill into the sky and people's eyes and there's no reason a 50-watt Sodium light couldnt be doing the same work as a present-day 100-watter splashing excess light in all directions.

Nevertheless, Id like to hear more about Commissioner Simonson's plan.     

[patric]

Intended to be inspiration, not an endorsement:


Streetlights are among a city's most important and expensive assets, accounting for almost 40 percent of its electricity bill.
A managed street lighting network based on Echelon's technology offers cities an innovative way to control costs. It lowers energy use and carbon dioxide emissions, beautifies neighborhoods, improves safety, and offers many other benefits, all from a single, networked infrastructure.

How It Works

A LonWorks based street lighting system replaces older, inefficient mechanical ballasts in a city's streetlights with electronic ballasts. These ballasts communicate over existing power lines using Echelon's power line signaling technology. Echelon's i.LON SmartServers act as segment controllers, monitoring and controlling the streetlights. The servers:

Record lamp status, energy use, and running hours,
Collect data from traffic and weather sensors, and
Calculate the availability of natural light.
Using this data, the servers automatically dim some or all of the lamps. Software remotely controls the lamps, analyzes their behavior, monitors and identifies lamp failures, and measures and displays energy use.

http://www.echelon.com/solutions/streetlight/

White Paper
http://tinyurl.com/psf37a

I have read of several competing systems that do this, so maybe there's room for competitive bidding if Tulsa ever decides to get away from our present brute-force street lighting.  Just a thought.

[TURobY]

So, I again ask, what do we as normal citizens do? You are very knowledgable on the issues surrounding municipal lighting, but I don't know what good posting on a forum does. Who do we talk to and what is the best way to approach them to get change in our lighting fixtures?

[patric]

So, I again ask, what do we as normal citizens do? You are very knowledgable on the issues surrounding municipal lighting, but I don't know what good posting on a forum does. Who do we talk to and what is the best way to approach them to get change in our lighting fixtures?

When I talk to councilors, they usually say they hear from constituents who want more/brighter lights in their neighborhood, and they in turn put pressure on Public Works to make it happen.

Those constituents may not be able to cite anything beyond anecdotal belief that their neighborhoods arent safe without them, and yet they get action for no other reason than they cared enough to express their needs.

Now what if those same councilors were to hear from people with a more informed, active role in their neighborhoods and community, who understand the difference between roads built of concrete and asphalt, how projects are/should be funded, what we want our living spaces to look like and how our transportation system should work.

With few exceptions, this forum is much more substantiative than baseless griping and empty wishes, given the diverse interests that have all found a mutual platform on which to collect our thoughts on Tulsa's future.     

So it's not so much one person with a goal as it is everyone with an interest in the community.  I wouldnt have known what kind of paint to use on a street, or even cared, but it's sufficient that someone does and didnt mind sharing that for the possible benefit of all.

At some point we may be given more opportunities to have input in some future plan for Tulsa, and when the talk turns to concrete or paint or street lights, none of us will have to be just a passive observer in that process.
...that, and it never hurts to have spirited discussions with our leaders as to what should be on their radar. 

[patric]

If the light source doesnt protrude beneath the bell-shaped skirt, and the intensity is restrained so as to not pool too much light beneath the fixture, these proposed lights could be promising.
I dont know the make and model so I havent looked up the photometrics, but im guessing it's the "Memphis" style light from Holophane.  http://www.skykeepers.org/good_fixtures/ca-areapend.html

They are also one of several manufacturers that make a good Full-Cutoff "Acorn" substitute:
http://www.acuitybrandslighting.com/Library/Documents/HLP/Product%20Brochure/Utility%20Series/HL-2420.pdf

There are also rumblings about LED streetlighting for the Brady District.  Definitely want the 3200K color and not the 5600K blue-ish LEDs that look so cold and uninviting.   

[TheArtist]

Yes I noticed the new light poles in that rendering. You can also see they are planning on putting in more of the acorn lights in between. I REALLY hope they go with something thats not so harsh, cold and uninviting bulb wise or do the cut off ones for the rest. With the scale of this plan they are talking about, now would be the time to make the switch and then in the future, retrofit the ones that are already in. 

[TURobY]

You can also see they are planning on putting in more of the acorn lights in between.

While not perfect, it does look as if the acorns in the rendering have a cap on the top which would serve as a partial cut-off.

[sauerkraut]

One idea would be to use LED street lights, they use little power and burn for a long time.

[patric]

One idea would be to use LED street lights, they use little power and burn for a long time.

I have seen some really bad LED acorn designs, and some really good ones, so just being LED isnt necessarily a good thing.
Some designers are installing LEDs inside globes that point straight out at the horizon (and your eyes) like this one

(view from inside the globe)
You would want to avoid any design like this, as they are visually no better than the current retina-burning Metal Halide ones DTU is using.

The link I gave earlier for the acorn substitutes also includes Compact Fluorescent versions of Full-Cutoff (shielded) acorns.

The easiest way to spot a vision-friendly "Acorn" as opposed to the current glare bombs is the vision-friendly ones have clear glass, and the light source tucked up under an opaque cap, while the bad ones have frosted glass or a refractive surface.