New Streetlights

I take it then that texting rather than using a green laser is more socially acceptable?

Mark

P.S.
I don't advocate the the use of lasers to switch off street lights. But it does beg the question - should an individual citizen decide that a particular street light should be off - or dimmer - at any particular moment in time?

P.P.S I'm all for reduction in light pollution.

They should just have those PIR sensors so they will only turn on when your near them, if it sense's a person just a nice dim light to see the footpath and if it senses a car then something brighter to see the road! but it should swith off when nobody needs light!

mjc wrote:
P.S.
I don't advocate the the use of lasers to switch off street lights. But it does beg the question - should an individual citizen decide that a particular street light should be off - or dimmer - at any particular moment in time?[/quote]

The case of dimming the streetlight would be an exception. In general an individual citizen would not be permitted to do that; however its technically possible; so if you had an observatory in your garden and were on good terms with the council then it could be arranged.

In the general case this will work in the opposite way. Basically with the intelligent technology it becomes easy for streetlights to be dimmed or turned off completely as standard. So every night at midnight say the lights would dim down (or go off in some cases). Then you as a citizen could send a text to have the light at your house turned on for say 15 minutes.

Have a look at Sean Noone's talk at www.ustream.tv/recorded/2181443 (we'll have better video in a week or three; thats a recording of the live stream)

I took some mental notes over the weekend along my travels, and I note that Offaly County Council have installed FCO Lighting on all intersections along the new Tullamore bypass, opening imminently. I also noticed that lighting on the Ballinasloe bypass is also FCO lighting. Already, the junctions along the M6 are all using FCO where there are regular lighting poles used.

2 weeks ago, I encountered the M3 works near Navan and Kells, and noticed that the lighting going up (but not switched on yet) is also FCO.

It seems to be the norm lately that the majority of new lighting going up along artery developments are using FCO fixtures now.

Within the town of Tullamore, the Town Council have been replacing the older high pressure sodium lights on most of the existing older poles with Semi-FCO lighting.

Seanie.

Seanie_Morris wrote:It seems to be the norm lately that the majority of new lighting going up along artery developments are using FCO fixtures now.

Within the town of Tullamore, the Town Council have been replacing the older high pressure sodium lights on most of the existing older poles with Semi-FCO lighting.[/quote]

You are giving the Co. Co. a bit too much credit there

The lights on bypasses and motorways are the responsibility of the NRA who have been exclusively using FCO's for about 6 years now.

And the town lights will have been replaced by the ESB as part of standard maintainence. Their policy is to replace the older lights with the curved tempered glass designs. They still allow ~1% of the light to go up along the horizon which is still going to contribute significantly to skyglow but its progress. The ESB have been doing this for about 3 years now nationwide.