Council poised to install new street light bulbs

Spending  120,000 on installing new street light bulbs in the strath and other parts of the Highlands will save more cash in the long run, a senior councillor has predicted.

Highland Council is poised to convert several hundred streetlights in Nethy Bridge, Nairn, and other villages and towns in the Far North and Ross-shire into using low energy LED bulbs.

The local authority has faced increasing power bills for lighting in recent years and has run controversial trials switching them off in some areas to save cash.

The full council in Inverness will be asked tomorrow  to approve a proposal to spend 120,000 on the major refitting scheme from extra money allocated by the Scottish Government.

Graham Phillips, chairman of the council’s transport, environmental and community services (TECS) committee, said the costs of providing streetlights in the Highlands and paying for their use was escalating.

“We have had very successful pilots of LED lights and this is about spending to save, over 15 years we are going to make money back,” he said.

“Long-term, all our street lighting will be heading in this direction but that will take a number of years.”

Each LED street light will be about be 50 per cent cheaper to run than conventional lanterns. About 600 will be replaced, if councillors give the green light.

TECS director Neil Gillies said he did not expect the public to object to the move.

“It is just as bright although they are a much lower wattage,” he said. “We have done some trials in Inverness and people haven’t really noticed the difference.”

As well as Nethy, bulbs will be replaced in John O’Groats, Castletown, Contin, along the Dingwall-Maryburgh link road, on Nairn’s Mill Road and Carnach Crescent and the Croy bypass route.

The council has about 50,000 street lights in the region and energy costs have partly increased in recent years because of new housing developments.

It had aborted trials which saw every second street light switched off in communities following residents’ complaints about road safety. Boat of Garten as well as locations in Lochaber and Skye were areas which had participated.

Substantial price hikes in the network power connection have  put pressure on the council’s street lighting budget and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities has taken up the issue with the energy regulator Ofgem in London.

I’m one of several students who want more lights in our small town. Some students have even taken action to bring attention to this important issue.

One such student, Erik Taylor, called for more street lighting after he was attacked in the south-campus neighborhood last year in April, according to an article from Chico News and Review.

As a result, Taylor created a Facebook page called “More Lights Safer Nights,” dedicated to the cause of lighting up Chico.

Taking action is what our community needs to bring the problem to the attention of our City Council and police officials.

Maggie Vorhes, a sophomore environmental science major, wants more street lights installed, she said.

“‘Rape trail’ might not be called the rape trail if there were more lights,” Vorhes said.

Students who live off campus should voice their concerns to the Chico Police Department and ask whether it’s possible to install phones that could connect people in need to the department or Campus Connection personnel.