When was each streetlight technology used between?

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RJDG14
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When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by RJDG14 »

Can someone tell me the year/decade in which each of these streetlight variants was first installed, and where applicable, when installation of these variants ceased?

*Concrete lamposts (regardless of bulb)
*Mercury bulbs
*Low pressure sodium bulbs (if I'm correct, a lot of these were installed in the 1990s)
*High pressure sodium bulbs
*LEDs

I'd really like to know all of them if possible, in particular when the last concrete posts were installed, and when low pressure sodium bulbs stopped being commonly used. My guess on the each of them goes as follows:

*Concrete posts - early 1950s - late 1980s
*Mercury - <1940s - late 1970s
*LPS - 1960s - mid 1990s
*HPS - 1970s - early 2010s
*LEDs - early 2000s - present
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by wrinkly »

I'd guess LPS was already a biggish thing by 1960.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by kit »

Are you aiming for when they were last commonly installed, or last commonly maintained (e.g. if the lantern failed it would be replaced with the same type of bulb?

Concrete columns were still being installed into the mid-1990s and SON is still being installed now (albeit largely replaced by LED).
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by Truvelo »

You've missed CFL. Staffordshire had a mad craze around ten years ago where virtually every casual replacement on smaller roads used it. It has since been made redundant by LED.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by brummie_rob »

Concrete was certainly used until the mid 1990's in Solihull, these being some of the last I recall being installed: https://goo.gl/maps/gcoZNEL2bD32
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by Patrick Harper »

MBF:

All roads: 1930s-1970s, most were retrofitted with SON lamps

SOX (and its direct predecessors):

Major roads: 1930s-1997, casual replacements until c.2015
Minor roads: 1950s-2004, "
Side roads: 1950s-2000s casual replacements fizzled out after 2010

SON and lamps of a similar form factor

Major roads: 1967-current
Minor and side roads: 1980s-current

LED-based luminaires

Major and minor roads: 2010-current
Side roads: 2008-current

Laser diode-based luminaires

After 2020?

As far as concrete columns are concerned, major road installations became rare by the end of the 60s. Side road columns lingered on into the 90s. Fluorescent lanterns were installed, mostly in the 1950s and early 60s. Most were replaced in the 70s and 80s.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by bothar »

Paianni wrote:MBF

All roads: 1930s-1970s, most were retrofitted with SON lamps

SOX (and its direct predecessors):

Major roads: 1930s-1997, casual replacements until c.2015
Minor roads: 1950s-2004, "
Side roads: 1950s-2000s casual replacements until c.2011

SON and lamps of a similar form factor

Major roads: 1967-current
Minor and side roads: 1980s-current

LED-based luminaires

Major and minor roads: 2010-current
Side roads: 2008-current
Where do white fluorescent tubes fit in here?
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by RJDG14 »

As far as I know, there's no such thing as a laser diode street light. How's that supposed to work, anyway? I thought laser diodes were essentially LEDs.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by kit »

RJDG14 wrote:As far as I know, there's no such thing as a laser diode street light. How's that supposed to work, anyway? I thought laser diodes were essentially LEDs.
The idea is you either mix red, yellow, green and blue lasers or pass blue lasers through a phosphor coating to produce white light. Although potentially they could be two thirds more efficient than LEDs their main selling point is they are smaller and good for highly directional light.

So they may find a use in car headlights or similar but as neither small size nor highly directional light are really useful for street lighting I highly doubt we will be seeing them in 2020! They aren't really a game changer like SOX to SON or SON to LED was.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by KeithW »

You have missed out one of the longest lasting of all.

Gas lights first appeared in parts of London between 1807 and 1813 and remained commonplace well into the 1950's. As a lad I recall the man with a long taper lighting the lamps in Stockton On Tees. There are still over 1000 gas street lights in service in London.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by KeithW »

bothar wrote:
Where do white fluorescent tubes fit in here?
Good question many SOX installations have been replaced by Compact Fluorescent lamps in recent years. As I understand it they are relatively cheap and efficient.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by Patrick Harper »

kit wrote:The idea is you either mix red, yellow, green and blue lasers or pass blue lasers through a phosphor coating to produce white light. Although potentially they could be two thirds more efficient than LEDs their main selling point is they are smaller and good for highly directional light.

So they may find a use in car headlights or similar but as neither small size nor highly directional light are really useful for street lighting I highly doubt we will be seeing them in 2020! They aren't really a game changer like SOX to SON or SON to LED was.
That's not really what I was envisioning. The game changer with lasers is that they do monochromatic light really well, as good as SOX. I am currently involved in a road scheme that involves a roundabout adjacent a bat roost, and while it would require some collaboration and R&D, amber-coloured lasers could come in real handy for this application.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by RichardA626 »

http://www.streetlightonline.co.uk/a6prelphotos.htm

This is a very good street lighting site, any idea what SLI/H involves?

PS: According to this site it's Low Pressure Sodium - Double-ended (SLI/H)
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by RJDG14 »

There are still a handful of mercury lanterns dotted around if you know where to look. I saw what I believe (from that website) to be a GEC Z8896 around the Church Stretton area a few weeks ago. Does anyone know when the bulb was last replaced?

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@52.55217 ... 6656?hl=en

Back in 2000, how common was each type of light roughly? Obviously there would have been no LEDs, but I meant how common concrete posts were, and what proportion were SOX, SON and mercury. It would have probably depended on the area, though.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by bothar »

KeithW wrote:
bothar wrote:
Where do white fluorescent tubes fit in here?
Good question many SOX installations have been replaced by Compact Fluorescent lamps in recent years. As I understand it they are relatively cheap and efficient.
I wasn't referring to the modern CFL phase, although I've seen a small number of lights that are more or less regular tubes. I was referring to the pre SOX period. When I was old enough to notice such things, in the late 60s, in Ireland almost all street lights in the ROI were mercury, and a large proportion in NI were fluorescent tubes such as you might have in a shop.

This is the NI A1 in the 1950s and these are almost certainly regular fluorescent tubes.

Image
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by RJDG14 »

Were these the type you used to get on high streets where the lantern was very wide?
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by Patrick Harper »

Well, unless they were higher wattage SOX, as the lanterns for those were just as long.

Fluorescent lanterns may have died out more quickly since with a longer fixture there are more opportunities for water to seep in. As the control gear failed lighting departments may have been looking at alternative MBF and SON solutions as the lanterns tended to provide a better seal, along with efficiency in the case of SON.

By the 2000s of course, shorter fluorescent lamps had improved in luminescence and efficiency, so the fixtures became more practical, especially when SOX was falling out of favour. But it was still mostly relegated to side roads; by this time metal halide had trounced the competition in town centres.
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Re: When was each streetlight technology used between?

Post by sotonsteve »

RJDG14 wrote:Can someone tell me the year/decade in which each of these streetlight variants was first installed, and where applicable, when installation of these variants ceased?

*Concrete lamposts (regardless of bulb)
*Mercury bulbs
*Low pressure sodium bulbs (if I'm correct, a lot of these were installed in the 1990s)
*High pressure sodium bulbs
*LEDs

I'd really like to know all of them if possible, in particular when the last concrete posts were installed, and when low pressure sodium bulbs stopped being commonly used. My guess on the each of them goes as follows:

*Concrete posts - early 1950s - late 1980s
*Mercury - <1940s - late 1970s
*LPS - 1960s - mid 1990s
*HPS - 1970s - early 2010s
*LEDs - early 2000s - present
Concrete columns started appearing in the 1930s, were at the height of popularity from the 1950s to 1970s, and continued to be installed until the 1990s.
Mercury appeared in the 1930s, and at first was more popular on main roads, before being at the height of popularity again from the 1950s to 1970s. Some mercury continued to be installed new into the 2000s.
Low pressure sodium, again, appeared in the 1930s, was very popular from the 1950s to 1990s, and the odd couple are still being installed as casual replacements in some areas.
High pressure sodium appeared in the 1960s, and started to become popular in the 1980s. It is still a popular choice even now.
LED first appeared in the second half of the 2000s, but has only become popular in the last few years.
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