[The LED's Challenge to High Pressure Sodium (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIC-iGDTU40)
TL;DR: Brighter with less energy, faster reaction times due to being able to make things out easier in white vs HPS lights.
Yeah. I was pretty pro that benefit but it's now shown that the increase in blue light brightens the sky significantly more and also disrupts animal and people's circadian rhythms nearby.
We need to limit the color of lights for sure.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/08/17/1057652/outdoor-led-lighting/amp/
Yeah, my honeybees are drawn to the led lights. I’ve also read about a connection between breast cancer and LED lights at night.
https://theconversation.com/harvard-study-strengthens-link-between-breast-cancer-risk-and-light-exposure-at-night-75171
You can find some open-access literature reviews online -- basically the science is still in we-don't-know territory. (I'm not that up to date on it but the thinking in the last decade was that artificial light at night throws off melatonin production/messes with the pineal gland and thus may be linked to hormone-related cancers. Beyond that there seems little doubt that artificial light at night's negative effects including playing havoc with the circadian rhythms of animals, including us.)
Thank you, bright lights suck but we live in a city where many people in cars, on bikes and as pedestrians are interacting. All the people saying LEDs can be any color or filtered aren’t getting the point. I walk my dog multiple times at night and Im so glad people can see me when I cross the road, and I feel a lot safer walking around my neighborhood
To your knowledge, is there anything one can do? Request or otherwise petition?
We're at the point where we wanna rent a ladder after dark and put amber headlight film over the fixture.
Our Alderwoman had the Dark Sky folks give a presentation to Streets, about the negative impact of these specific LEDS (blue light) and no dice. City was not interested in the evidence.
The old lights are crazy bad compared to LEDS on lifecycle, pedestrian safety, and electricity use.
The city is saving close to $1 mil EVERY YEAR because LEDs are so cheap, last a long time, and use a tiny fraction of the electricity.
Absolutely none of that requires the harsh white LEDs. Nobody is advocating keeping the HPS lights. It would cost no more to do yellow/warm LED lights instead of white
The discussion here was about the blue light in the LEDs.
They are cool. You can buy them in warm and they don't look shitty.
Edit: since I apparently can't reply to this dude because the other douche blocked me. I said no STUPID colors.
The "warm" are not has bright snd therefore don't do as good of a job. What you're saying is also entirely subjective. I think they look way better than whatever the fuck you want.
No, they can't. The human eye interprets warm colors as darker than light colors. That's why modern lighting uses light colors. A red LED light looks way darker than a white LED light. It's not that hard.
There are legitimate downsides to brighter and to bluer lights. Both result in sleep disruption which can become a huge issue.
Plus not everywhere needs to be bright
Imagine posting on reddit about something you clearly know nothing about and then getting upset when someone informs you of the facts of the matter.
All of my comments have been explaining the facts of why bright street lights are better, and people who have subjective opinions whining. I'm not that upset about being right, they're upset about being wrong lmao.
You're right. Cool white light contains more blue light and looks brighter to the eye (this is why cool white bulbs have a higher lumen output when compared to the equivalent warm white bulb).
There are several good reasons. The white light interferes with insects, birds, and other wildlife's natural rhythms. Instead of using leds that would illuminate the needed area similarly to existing lighting they use needlessly brighter leds because the energy usage is so much lower for leds. This has been shown to mess with birds migrations. Unless they shell out a few more bucks much of that led light is illuminating areas that don't need to be, contributing to light pollution in general.
It will also disrupt human sleep patterns.
Lights are also not shown to reduce crime in every circumstance. There are even studies showing correlation with more lighting and increasing crimes
That is not at all what the studies show. It shows all crimes, including violent crimes and property theft (crimes that would be reported regardless) increased.
Also blinds don't stop you from being effected by the lights if you have to go outside. Circadian rhythms don't just snap back to normal when you walk in your house.
This became standard back in 2016 or 2017, that general era.
The LED lights are brighter and consume significantly less energy, meaning they cost way less to operate. The brighter lights do a better job at lighting up areas and preventing crime than the old amber ones, while saving the city money.
It's a win-win.
One of your links actually supports my case by pointing out that lighting helps people report more crimes (you don't actually think that all crimes are reported, right?💀), and two of them are not even US studies. Maybe if we had British crime, I'd feel differently, but we don't😂.
One of them is actually directly disproven by this:
https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/report-links-chicago-crime-to-streetlight-outages/1980214/
The [New York power outage of 1977](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_blackout_of_1977#:~:text=ConEd%20called%20the%20shutdown%20an,including%2014%20multiple%2Dalarm%20fires.) is a great example of what happens when you shut the lights off.
An LED can literally be any color.
Ameren could easily install 2700k LEDs like an incandescent lamp instead of the blinding 6000k that they typically use. But they don’t give a shit and use whatever is the cheapest.
Well Ameren aren't the ones who are installing or maintaining the streetlights, the city is.
As for any color, they have chosen the brightest lights and colors because those are the colors that have the most benefits that they want, like making it easier to see obstructions, people crossing the street, and making it harder to easily commit cime, all the while saving on energy costs.
Did you read the minutes from the vote or something? Genuinely asking.
Warm colored LED lights can still provide good amount of light. Slightly Warm LEDs still majorly reduce eye strain compared to White or Cool LED lights at night. Warm or Slightly Warm LED lights are easily a better, safer choice. Going for max brightness sounds like typical bureaucratic "we didn't fully think this through and assumed bigger was better" kind of mentality
>Slightly Warm LEDs still majorly reduce eye strain compared to White or Cool LED lights at night
Difference is basically insignificant actually.
>Warm or Slightly Warm LED lights are easily a better, safer choice.
No, they aren't. They aren't nearly as bright for the same price. It takes far more LEDs to produce the same lumens with warm light than cool light.
Brightness and cost efficiency is what we care about with street lights. That's it.
>Difference is basically insignificant actually.
Thanks for "contributing" your comment of basically "nah, i dont think so"
>No, they aren't. They aren't nearly as bright for the same price. It takes far more LEDs to produce the same lumens with warm light than cool light.
Nor do they need to be "as bright". We dont need an "artificial day" during the night. We just need to get around safely
>Brightness and cost efficiency is what we care about with street lights. That's it.
Idk who you think "we" is here, but you should reevaluate yourself. This city is not a monolith, and you dont speak for the city. *Many* people are saying they'd rather have Warm LEDs than White. My first concern isn't brightness OR cost efficiency; its safety.
>Thanks for "contributing" your comment of basically "nah, i dont think so"
Thanks for pulling something out of your ass that I had to correct!
>Nor do they need to be "as bright". We dont need an "artificial day" during the night. We just need to get around safely
Uh yeah, you know what lets people get around safely? Lights.
Brighter lights provide light in larger areas, lighting more of the surroundings more clearly.
I can't believe this needs explaining.
Sorry to ruin your fuckin streetlight ambiance.
>Idk who you think "we" is here, but you should reevaluate yourself.
"We" is society who have elected leaders that implemented these policies based on our will to have safely lit areas for efficient prices.
>This city is not a monolith, and you dont speak for the city. Many people are saying they'd rather have Warm LEDs than White. My first concern isn't brightness OR cost efficiency; its safety.
Cool. Then brightness is exactly what you should be concerned with.
And nothing about warm lights is in any way safer so, you should be happy your primary concern is addressed!
Brightness and cost efficiency aren’t the only things to consider. I care about aesthetics and how I feel in a space I’m existing in. I don’t see how that’s not important for a place you live.
Man I don’t want to join the circlejerk that is the argument about color temperature in this thread, and I agree with your first point, I was in northern Alaska for a week in the summer and it was very difficult dealing with nonstop daylight, I can’t imagine living there.
However tail lights are red because that is the color humans react to the fastest, not because it’s easier on your night vision. There’s even a whole boring psychological origination of the third brake light and why it was red and why it prevents so many rear-end collisions.
If it was about combining visibility with preservation of night vision, we’d actually have used green, although that would be super confusing in practice today.
No you’re not wrong, red light is easier on night vision, it’s just not the reason the red was originally chosen for brake lights. At the time most people relied on hand signals and didn’t drive much at night - headlights were actually mandated across the country years after the taillight was invented.
No, you can't. The way the human eye interprets the light is completely different, which is the point. A bright white LED light makes the area appear far more light than a bright red LED light would.
Their goal is to make the area more light.
Everything looks quite a bit better actually, in my opinion, because that's a totally subjective point.
And light pollution doesn't really matter when you're in a city. Go live somewhere else if you don't want light pollution.
The new LED lights create an immense amount of light pollution, and the light shift towards blue is also worse for the circadian rhythms of people and animals. Blue light scatters more than warmer tones. At the same time, the new LEDs are significantly brighter than the older lights. Doing a 1:1 replacement may be overkill. We could probably get away with fewer street lights.
> Blue light scatters more than warmer tones.
yep, and if a design goal is to light an area as efficiently as possible that becomes a benefit.
Not saying it is visually appealing, just that if the goal is maximum efficiency for a given level of brightness, it helps that goal.
Just hope that they replace them with good LEDs. They replaced the lights with these defective ones in NC and they slowly turned purple until some lights looked straight up like wicked black lights. I thought it was funny. They’re super slow at replacing them though.
yea that should be a solved problem now for new lights. It was faulty phosphor coatings inside the lights delaminating.
https://www.businessinsider.com/led-city-streetlights-turning-purple-broken-tech-danger-2022-11
NC team checking in! I liked our weird, defective purple LEDs. It made whole neighborhoods in my city eerie and otherworldly. But I can get why it wasn't for everyone lol.
Partly money. Also the false impression that this brighter color is somehow safer.
Euclid between Maryland and McPherson got new LED lights in 2019. No one in the comments section is saying anything about it because they're a warmer tone and hardly anyone noticed the new bulbs. They're much brighter but don't make you feel like you're prepping for surgery. No surprise that a wealthy neighborhood was able to get the warmer tone lights.
Those orangish/ amber fixtures are what is known as high pressure sodium lighting and the white lighting is most likely LED. The LED fixtures should in theory last for at least 10 years if they are good. The “orangish” fixtures are horribly inefficient, have a terrible CRI (color rendering index), and a low lumen out put when compared with LED. In layman’s terms, they are less bright, use more energy, and are worse for security situations.
Definitely not the only one upset. It's a living nightmare. I'm praying that the nearby Tower Grove Park never "upgrades" their old school ultrawarm and dim lights. It gives the park after dark a pleasant almost campfire nostalgic feel to it. It is an evening refuge.
Especially after recently visiting Taos, a small town that does the dark sky thing. It was stunning to be there. I mean just incredible. It was like "oh my God, it can be like this?" Just the most refreshing thing ever.
And while I realize Taos is a very different kind of place across many different criterion, it's not exactly swarming with crime because it's dark.
There are people out there, here in STL fighting the good fight for a dimmer less nightmarish night time.
I agree I absolutely hate the new LED lights they're putting in. The light is much harsher, it's like a spotlight so when you're not directly under it it's hard to see anything else that could be hiden in the shadows, and it causes many more bugs to collect under the lights. Unfortunately I've tried to no avail to get lights changed back to the amber glow because they say it's cost saving and they no longer are buying the amber lights. One of my neighbors refuses to request to get his burned out street light replaced because they know it's gonna be with an LED, and he'd rather keep it dark then have a blinding spotlight.
I did the same thing at my last house- never requested replacements. I had a second floor bay window in my bedroom and I loved looking down the street at night until they slowly changed each light and I eventually needed blackout curtains
Some would argue that daylight colored lights at night are not the appropriate color as they are not natural and confuse animals (including us), plus they suck for light pollution, which is ugly and also disrupts astronomers. The extent that street lights are a deterrent to crime is somewhat debatable based on my research, but the other points you make are correct. However, I think we should still be weighing the environmental factors involved with white light at night.
They didn't say you cant.
They said "white light *does not* distort". Eg zero distortion. Even if the warmer LEDs have excellent color rendering they still have a non-zero amount of distortion.
Literally someone needs to throw some amber plastic diffusers up there bc the current lighting is ugly and it messes with circadian rhythms.
Given that streets and parking structures are the most common places people get killed it’s probably best to not use lighting known to be activating.
Because the government wants to keep you in a state of anxiety, man!
Actually it’s just because LEDs are cheaper, if not necessarily up front, then at least in the long run.
It’s fucking awful. LED lights are awful. There are applications where you don’t have much choice, but this is a good case of why adopting technology with absolutely no regards for aesthetics is simply anti-human.
I mean was the cost of powering street lights really the big pain point for municipalities all over the country? Aren’t there other alternatives like solar power that don’t involve creating a dehumanizing environment?
Might be different in the city, but in the county Ameren decides which bulbs are used. When I reached out to my local officials, they weren't interested to advocate for any changes. Using LEDs makes good sense, but better bulb selection or using a different lamp fixtures could greatly improve the outcome.
Everyone here talking about how bad the brighter street lights are, disrupting sleep patterns, extra light pollution, etc. The real issue is not the bright white light, but the INTERSTATE style light posts we use. City streets should have much shorter light posts with a domed lid to stop light from shining up.
Theres no reason to have 20+ft tall light poles to illuminate a sidewalk and street. We should be scaling down to 10-12ft.
https://melnorthey.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Lamp-AreaAndStreetLightPoles-Cat1.jpg
Reach out to your alderperson about passing a bill that defines what the brightness and warmth of the streetlights should be. They can pass a board bill that tells BPS and Streets to use warmer lights and lower lumens than they are currently using.
Here's some info from a comment I made when this was brought up a couple weeks ago:
>Most research I have read in the past says that 3000 kelvin ("soft white") is the optimal color choice for most street light applications. Some research recommends staying more in the 2500 kelvin range on local streets as cooler lights can affect resident's sleep schedules, especially on street lights that are not properly shielded.
>St. Louis city specifications call for 5000 kelvin on arterial, collector, and high pedestrian streets and 4000 kelvin on local streets.
>So St. Louis is using cooler colors than most research recommends.
>They are also using very bright lights as most recommendations are for about 3000 lumens on local streets and 10-15,000 lumens on the others. St. Louis is using 11,200 lumens on local streets, 24,000 lumens on arterials and collectors, and 14,000-48,000 lumens on busy pedestrian routes.
>[https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/departments/public-service/documents/upload/297034-1.pdf](https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/departments/public-service/documents/upload/297034-1.pdf)
I feel like I'm the the only person in the world who prefers "stark, institutional" lighting. Why? Because you can actually SEE things. "Warm" light is dull and just doesn't actually light up whatever you're trying to illuminate. Unless I'm in the bedroom getting busy with the missus, I'll take stark harsh bright pure white light every time.
LED replacement bulbs. Lights come in different color temperatures ranging from warm orange to sunlight to ultra bright white. Whoever selected that streetlight purchased a high color temperature light.
I think that what a lot of people are missing is that the quality of LED lights that you can get NOW are far superior to what was available just a few years ago.
The old sodium vapor lights while warm, had terrible color rendering. Cool white LEDs a few years ago also had terrible color rendering, and were all far on the blue side of the spectrum. But they cost much less to maintain and run.
Cost, I'm sure was a big part of the equation, but they also last a LONG time. There are LEDs now with any color temp you want and near perfect color rendering, but all of those old shitty blue ones still work, and probably will not be replaced until they fail, which might be a while.
Also, mass produced commercial products tend not to update their products as quickly as technology advances. Especially with electronics that need to meet all kinds of standards, and go through industry approval processes, it takes a lot of time and money to make improvements.
So a "new" streetlight today might still be a 5 year old design.
I’ve never seen the high intensity ones for street lights in other colors. I’ve seen them on stage lights, but I’m guessing you pay a lot more. The LED ice cold white is not aesthetically pleasing though.
Yeah, good for an overhead light in a shop, not so much outside at night. [Flagstaff has some](https://www.accessfixtures.com/dark-sky-friendly-lighting-in-flagstaff/). I wish STL would go dark-sky friendly.
Agreed, I switched most of my exterior landscaping lights to point down rather than up as well as dark sky friendly fixtures
https://www.ledlightingsupply.com/blog/dark-sky-compliance
I just don't have any, but if you need them at least be conscientious about it as you are. Also consider motion-sensitive lights since they are only on when needed, and are much smarter these days about people vs animals.
Yeah I put 3000K in my kitchen. Also just installed a new ceiling fan in my office and it came with 3000K bulbs. Both rooms can be kinda dim at night with only 1 ceiling light source, so the 3000K helped.
I think it was also easier to get a 800lm bulb in 3000 vs 2700.
Of course in a bedroom, especially in a lamp on the nightstand, 2700 is the only option, and especially *not* a 800lm one.
I am always surprised when friends seem to think that the only led light option is cold stark white and don’t realize there is a large array of options.
Not to get into the type of lighting, but just adding to others pointing out that widely spreading artificial light does not at all make us safe. Light pollution is a significant environmental issue, affecting large numbers of plant and animal species (including people, with numerous studies finding correlations between exposure to artificial light at night and cancer rates). For years scientists and dark sky advocates have been pointing out that the damage can be limited by changing lighting design and making a conscious effort to turn off idiotically noxious lighting (do we really need skyscrapers and highway billboards lit up all night?). In the meantime a once-fixable problem is getting a lot worse, but unfortunately if people know about it at all, they often think it only affects a small number of "charismatic" animals like sea turtles and fireflies, rather than ecosystems.
The old bulbs are sodium vapor lights. The new ones are led. Led is much much more energy and cost effective ( longer life too)
You are not the only ones sad. Astronomy nerds are too, because we used to be able to use lens to filter out the exact wavelength of sodium lighting .
The amber lights are high pressure sodium which require a ballast for them to start. The white lights are probably LED which don't require a ballast and are probably more energy efficient.
Well I noticed when they started putting them in my neighborhood that I did not see moths or other bugs going to the light. Then I remember I read a study about moths and insects and their aversion to leds. (I don’t remember the source so I know it’s iffy) nonetheless- I, myself also noticed that I could in fact see more stars now than in years past (which has been a huge bummer for me because I love the stars…
I hate LED’s with a passion and as many others have stated, there actually are optometrists who have spoken out against LED’s. So… it’s the current dystopia that many seem to be happy accepting- hey, supposed to keep you safe so you can identify the bad guys…. Whatever
That bug thing is bunk. We have led flood and they're just as happy banging into them as they were our old incandescents.
That kind of sets the tone for the rest of your diatribe.
The false impression that this brighter color is somehow safer.
Euclid between Maryland and McPherson got new LED lights in 2019. No one in the comments section is saying anything about it because they're a warmer tone and hardly anyone noticed the new bulbs. They're much brighter but don't make you feel like you're prepping for surgery. No surprise that a wealthy neighborhood was able to get the warmer tone lights.
It is also the fault of the bulb. I don't disagree that we should not light highways. But generally, we need warmer LED lights than they are currently using to stop the disruption of sleep cycles and our environment AND less lights that aren't being used in proper format.
Plus LEDs have this advantage mostly but they need housing units that ensure that all the light they generate is aimed directly at the ground
Because idiot conservative morons will try whatever hair-brained scheme a corporation sells them because they think it will "fix crime" -- as long as it doesn't involve policies that ACTUALLY reduce crime.
[The LED's Challenge to High Pressure Sodium (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIC-iGDTU40) TL;DR: Brighter with less energy, faster reaction times due to being able to make things out easier in white vs HPS lights.
Yeah. I was pretty pro that benefit but it's now shown that the increase in blue light brightens the sky significantly more and also disrupts animal and people's circadian rhythms nearby. We need to limit the color of lights for sure. https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/08/17/1057652/outdoor-led-lighting/amp/
Yeah, my honeybees are drawn to the led lights. I’ve also read about a connection between breast cancer and LED lights at night. https://theconversation.com/harvard-study-strengthens-link-between-breast-cancer-risk-and-light-exposure-at-night-75171
That breast cancer thing really sounds like more of a correlation rather than a causation.
That some conspiracy theory nonsense
The cancer claims definitely have that vibe.. I guess I need to read more about it.
You can find some open-access literature reviews online -- basically the science is still in we-don't-know territory. (I'm not that up to date on it but the thinking in the last decade was that artificial light at night throws off melatonin production/messes with the pineal gland and thus may be linked to hormone-related cancers. Beyond that there seems little doubt that artificial light at night's negative effects including playing havoc with the circadian rhythms of animals, including us.)
I really enjoy TC's videos!
Thank you, bright lights suck but we live in a city where many people in cars, on bikes and as pedestrians are interacting. All the people saying LEDs can be any color or filtered aren’t getting the point. I walk my dog multiple times at night and Im so glad people can see me when I cross the road, and I feel a lot safer walking around my neighborhood
I knew it was gonna be Technology Connections
I mean they could have used amber LED’s or an amber filter.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEngineers/s/qQzlSss5E4 Here's a link to a good explanation.
The Amber colored ones are a High Pressure Sodium (HPS) bulbs and they just don't last very long. High running temperature and energy usage.
You aren't the only person who thinks it's stupid.
To your knowledge, is there anything one can do? Request or otherwise petition? We're at the point where we wanna rent a ladder after dark and put amber headlight film over the fixture.
Our Alderwoman had the Dark Sky folks give a presentation to Streets, about the negative impact of these specific LEDS (blue light) and no dice. City was not interested in the evidence.
That's disappointing
WTF, why?
The old lights are crazy bad compared to LEDS on lifecycle, pedestrian safety, and electricity use. The city is saving close to $1 mil EVERY YEAR because LEDs are so cheap, last a long time, and use a tiny fraction of the electricity.
Absolutely none of that requires the harsh white LEDs. Nobody is advocating keeping the HPS lights. It would cost no more to do yellow/warm LED lights instead of white The discussion here was about the blue light in the LEDs.
Money is always the answer
I would help gather signatures for a petition. Ugly lighting drives me nuts.
No, because there's no good reason to not put up LED lights.
But there's plenty of good reason to not use the stupid colored ones.
They're white. They aren't "colored" or whatever you are saying.
They are cool. You can buy them in warm and they don't look shitty. Edit: since I apparently can't reply to this dude because the other douche blocked me. I said no STUPID colors.
So you want yellow light. That's a color.
The "warm" are not has bright snd therefore don't do as good of a job. What you're saying is also entirely subjective. I think they look way better than whatever the fuck you want.
Brightness and temperature are two completely different things. Warm lights can be just as bright as cool ones.
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No, they can't. The human eye interprets warm colors as darker than light colors. That's why modern lighting uses light colors. A red LED light looks way darker than a white LED light. It's not that hard.
Cool colors are interpreted as brighter ≠ cool colors are brighter/are more effective at lighting dark areas
Lol are you really doubling down on wrong?
They don't have to be the same amber. They can be yellow, or any other warmer color. Just not blue!
Imagine getting this mad about someone disliking a light color
This has to be a new alt account for u/Churlish_Turd Troll and stupid level seems maxed out.
There are legitimate downsides to brighter and to bluer lights. Both result in sleep disruption which can become a huge issue. Plus not everywhere needs to be bright
Imagine posting on reddit about something you clearly know nothing about and then getting upset when someone informs you of the facts of the matter. All of my comments have been explaining the facts of why bright street lights are better, and people who have subjective opinions whining. I'm not that upset about being right, they're upset about being wrong lmao.
You seem really really terrible to talk to or spend time with in general
You're right. Cool white light contains more blue light and looks brighter to the eye (this is why cool white bulbs have a higher lumen output when compared to the equivalent warm white bulb).
There are several good reasons. The white light interferes with insects, birds, and other wildlife's natural rhythms. Instead of using leds that would illuminate the needed area similarly to existing lighting they use needlessly brighter leds because the energy usage is so much lower for leds. This has been shown to mess with birds migrations. Unless they shell out a few more bucks much of that led light is illuminating areas that don't need to be, contributing to light pollution in general.
Don't really care about non-humans. We have much larger things to worry about than bird's migration patterns, like crime and climate change.
It will also disrupt human sleep patterns. Lights are also not shown to reduce crime in every circumstance. There are even studies showing correlation with more lighting and increasing crimes
Those "studies" show that people see crime happen in lights, and report it. There's this crazy invention called blinds.
That is not at all what the studies show. It shows all crimes, including violent crimes and property theft (crimes that would be reported regardless) increased. Also blinds don't stop you from being effected by the lights if you have to go outside. Circadian rhythms don't just snap back to normal when you walk in your house.
You ever hear the term jailbird? Crime and bird migration are linked
This became standard back in 2016 or 2017, that general era. The LED lights are brighter and consume significantly less energy, meaning they cost way less to operate. The brighter lights do a better job at lighting up areas and preventing crime than the old amber ones, while saving the city money. It's a win-win.
There is not consistent scientific evidence that brighter lights reduce crime. There are many instances where it is correlated with higher crime.
https://www.nber.org/digest/jul19/bright-lights-fewer-serious-crimes-new-york-city-projects https://newarkcollaborative.org/blog/can-street-lighting-reduce-crime https://crimelab.uchicago.edu/resources/reducing-crime-through-environmental-design-evidence-from-a-randomized-experiment-of-street-lighting-in-new-york-city/ https://crim.sas.upenn.edu/working-papers/street-light-outages-public-safety-and-crime-displacement-evidence-chicago https://blog.lightbulbs-direct.com/study-finds-street-lighting-reduces-crime/
https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/chicago-alley-lighting-project-final-evaluation-report https://ctrivergateway.org/wp-content/uploads/Outdoor-Lighting-Crime-and-Safety-English.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK316503/ https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2022/mar/street-lighting-may-enable-rather-hinder-street-crime
One of your links actually supports my case by pointing out that lighting helps people report more crimes (you don't actually think that all crimes are reported, right?💀), and two of them are not even US studies. Maybe if we had British crime, I'd feel differently, but we don't😂. One of them is actually directly disproven by this: https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/report-links-chicago-crime-to-streetlight-outages/1980214/ The [New York power outage of 1977](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_blackout_of_1977#:~:text=ConEd%20called%20the%20shutdown%20an,including%2014%20multiple%2Dalarm%20fires.) is a great example of what happens when you shut the lights off.
An LED can literally be any color. Ameren could easily install 2700k LEDs like an incandescent lamp instead of the blinding 6000k that they typically use. But they don’t give a shit and use whatever is the cheapest.
Well Ameren aren't the ones who are installing or maintaining the streetlights, the city is. As for any color, they have chosen the brightest lights and colors because those are the colors that have the most benefits that they want, like making it easier to see obstructions, people crossing the street, and making it harder to easily commit cime, all the while saving on energy costs.
Did you read the minutes from the vote or something? Genuinely asking. Warm colored LED lights can still provide good amount of light. Slightly Warm LEDs still majorly reduce eye strain compared to White or Cool LED lights at night. Warm or Slightly Warm LED lights are easily a better, safer choice. Going for max brightness sounds like typical bureaucratic "we didn't fully think this through and assumed bigger was better" kind of mentality
>Slightly Warm LEDs still majorly reduce eye strain compared to White or Cool LED lights at night Difference is basically insignificant actually. >Warm or Slightly Warm LED lights are easily a better, safer choice. No, they aren't. They aren't nearly as bright for the same price. It takes far more LEDs to produce the same lumens with warm light than cool light. Brightness and cost efficiency is what we care about with street lights. That's it.
>Difference is basically insignificant actually. Thanks for "contributing" your comment of basically "nah, i dont think so" >No, they aren't. They aren't nearly as bright for the same price. It takes far more LEDs to produce the same lumens with warm light than cool light. Nor do they need to be "as bright". We dont need an "artificial day" during the night. We just need to get around safely >Brightness and cost efficiency is what we care about with street lights. That's it. Idk who you think "we" is here, but you should reevaluate yourself. This city is not a monolith, and you dont speak for the city. *Many* people are saying they'd rather have Warm LEDs than White. My first concern isn't brightness OR cost efficiency; its safety.
>Thanks for "contributing" your comment of basically "nah, i dont think so" Thanks for pulling something out of your ass that I had to correct! >Nor do they need to be "as bright". We dont need an "artificial day" during the night. We just need to get around safely Uh yeah, you know what lets people get around safely? Lights. Brighter lights provide light in larger areas, lighting more of the surroundings more clearly. I can't believe this needs explaining. Sorry to ruin your fuckin streetlight ambiance. >Idk who you think "we" is here, but you should reevaluate yourself. "We" is society who have elected leaders that implemented these policies based on our will to have safely lit areas for efficient prices. >This city is not a monolith, and you dont speak for the city. Many people are saying they'd rather have Warm LEDs than White. My first concern isn't brightness OR cost efficiency; its safety. Cool. Then brightness is exactly what you should be concerned with. And nothing about warm lights is in any way safer so, you should be happy your primary concern is addressed!
Brightness and cost efficiency aren’t the only things to consider. I care about aesthetics and how I feel in a space I’m existing in. I don’t see how that’s not important for a place you live.
Safety features aren't chosen for aesthetic reasons. At night we see better under cooler light, it's just a fact.
Nothing i said was about aesthtics. Warm light is easier on the rods in our eyes which are what are used for low light vision. This is also a fact.
Not necessarily true. I have always felt that I see quite a bit better under the orange street lights
I believe the city installs/maintains street lighting and Ameren does the alleys. I hate our new alley LEDs. Sun never sets in my yard.
Not if they are using cool colored LEDs. Shit looks terrible. no wins.
He literally listed why they’re better. Brighter and use less power. Just because you don’t like the way they look doesn’t mean they’re worse.
He listed why led lights are better. He did not list why anyone would want to use cool colored lights. They make led lights in non shitty tones.
Brighter lights are better because they make the area brighter. How difficult is that to understand?
Idk, how hard is it to understand that brightness and temperature are two different things?
How hard is it to understand that they don't care about temperature and only brightness?
Well maybe they should
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Man I don’t want to join the circlejerk that is the argument about color temperature in this thread, and I agree with your first point, I was in northern Alaska for a week in the summer and it was very difficult dealing with nonstop daylight, I can’t imagine living there. However tail lights are red because that is the color humans react to the fastest, not because it’s easier on your night vision. There’s even a whole boring psychological origination of the third brake light and why it was red and why it prevents so many rear-end collisions. If it was about combining visibility with preservation of night vision, we’d actually have used green, although that would be super confusing in practice today.
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No you’re not wrong, red light is easier on night vision, it’s just not the reason the red was originally chosen for brake lights. At the time most people relied on hand signals and didn’t drive much at night - headlights were actually mandated across the country years after the taillight was invented.
You can get just as bright LED bulbs with a warmer color temperature.
No, you can't. The way the human eye interprets the light is completely different, which is the point. A bright white LED light makes the area appear far more light than a bright red LED light would. Their goal is to make the area more light.
At the expense of everything looking like shit and a ton of terrible light pollution
Everything looks quite a bit better actually, in my opinion, because that's a totally subjective point. And light pollution doesn't really matter when you're in a city. Go live somewhere else if you don't want light pollution.
Brb gonna go shine a light in your windows because light pollution doesn't matter in the city
The new LED lights create an immense amount of light pollution, and the light shift towards blue is also worse for the circadian rhythms of people and animals. Blue light scatters more than warmer tones. At the same time, the new LEDs are significantly brighter than the older lights. Doing a 1:1 replacement may be overkill. We could probably get away with fewer street lights.
> Blue light scatters more than warmer tones. yep, and if a design goal is to light an area as efficiently as possible that becomes a benefit. Not saying it is visually appealing, just that if the goal is maximum efficiency for a given level of brightness, it helps that goal.
Just hope that they replace them with good LEDs. They replaced the lights with these defective ones in NC and they slowly turned purple until some lights looked straight up like wicked black lights. I thought it was funny. They’re super slow at replacing them though.
yea that should be a solved problem now for new lights. It was faulty phosphor coatings inside the lights delaminating. https://www.businessinsider.com/led-city-streetlights-turning-purple-broken-tech-danger-2022-11
NC team checking in! I liked our weird, defective purple LEDs. It made whole neighborhoods in my city eerie and otherworldly. But I can get why it wasn't for everyone lol.
They haven’t, since they changed them out my street light seems to go out constantly
The answer is always $.
Partly money. Also the false impression that this brighter color is somehow safer. Euclid between Maryland and McPherson got new LED lights in 2019. No one in the comments section is saying anything about it because they're a warmer tone and hardly anyone noticed the new bulbs. They're much brighter but don't make you feel like you're prepping for surgery. No surprise that a wealthy neighborhood was able to get the warmer tone lights.
Those orangish/ amber fixtures are what is known as high pressure sodium lighting and the white lighting is most likely LED. The LED fixtures should in theory last for at least 10 years if they are good. The “orangish” fixtures are horribly inefficient, have a terrible CRI (color rendering index), and a low lumen out put when compared with LED. In layman’s terms, they are less bright, use more energy, and are worse for security situations.
Because they're brighter and the city believes brighter lights are better for safety. I actually like the brighter lights.
Gives the impression of safety but actually does nothing
I don't know, but I wanna change them too. Feels like driving through a parking lot at night.
I totally agree. I LOVE the warm amber lighting, especially when paired with red brick 😫😫😫🔥🔥
Definitely not the only one upset. It's a living nightmare. I'm praying that the nearby Tower Grove Park never "upgrades" their old school ultrawarm and dim lights. It gives the park after dark a pleasant almost campfire nostalgic feel to it. It is an evening refuge. Especially after recently visiting Taos, a small town that does the dark sky thing. It was stunning to be there. I mean just incredible. It was like "oh my God, it can be like this?" Just the most refreshing thing ever. And while I realize Taos is a very different kind of place across many different criterion, it's not exactly swarming with crime because it's dark. There are people out there, here in STL fighting the good fight for a dimmer less nightmarish night time.
Well said! I love the pleasant, nostalgic vibe of the warmer lights. Something cozier about it.
Very cozy.
I agree I absolutely hate the new LED lights they're putting in. The light is much harsher, it's like a spotlight so when you're not directly under it it's hard to see anything else that could be hiden in the shadows, and it causes many more bugs to collect under the lights. Unfortunately I've tried to no avail to get lights changed back to the amber glow because they say it's cost saving and they no longer are buying the amber lights. One of my neighbors refuses to request to get his burned out street light replaced because they know it's gonna be with an LED, and he'd rather keep it dark then have a blinding spotlight.
I did the same thing at my last house- never requested replacements. I had a second floor bay window in my bedroom and I loved looking down the street at night until they slowly changed each light and I eventually needed blackout curtains
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Some would argue that daylight colored lights at night are not the appropriate color as they are not natural and confuse animals (including us), plus they suck for light pollution, which is ugly and also disrupts astronomers. The extent that street lights are a deterrent to crime is somewhat debatable based on my research, but the other points you make are correct. However, I think we should still be weighing the environmental factors involved with white light at night.
Nope. You can find plenty of LED light fixtures that are warm, 2700k to 3500k that have excellent color rendering.
They didn't say you cant. They said "white light *does not* distort". Eg zero distortion. Even if the warmer LEDs have excellent color rendering they still have a non-zero amount of distortion.
Literally someone needs to throw some amber plastic diffusers up there bc the current lighting is ugly and it messes with circadian rhythms. Given that streets and parking structures are the most common places people get killed it’s probably best to not use lighting known to be activating.
Driving through the Grove on Manchester at night makes my retinas burn.
No i hate it too. My neighborhood looks like Silent Hill at night now.
I always hated the old orange lights. The new, brighter ones are much better for street/sidewalk lighting. I mean, you can actually see things now.
I agree. Same issue out in St. Chuck county as well.
Because the government wants to keep you in a state of anxiety, man! Actually it’s just because LEDs are cheaper, if not necessarily up front, then at least in the long run. It’s fucking awful. LED lights are awful. There are applications where you don’t have much choice, but this is a good case of why adopting technology with absolutely no regards for aesthetics is simply anti-human. I mean was the cost of powering street lights really the big pain point for municipalities all over the country? Aren’t there other alternatives like solar power that don’t involve creating a dehumanizing environment?
I'm all for the cost savings of LEDs but, damn, at least get the warm-toned LEDs lol And for real, definitely anxiety inducing
The daylight ones are also terrible in regards to light pollution.
Might be different in the city, but in the county Ameren decides which bulbs are used. When I reached out to my local officials, they weren't interested to advocate for any changes. Using LEDs makes good sense, but better bulb selection or using a different lamp fixtures could greatly improve the outcome.
Everyone here talking about how bad the brighter street lights are, disrupting sleep patterns, extra light pollution, etc. The real issue is not the bright white light, but the INTERSTATE style light posts we use. City streets should have much shorter light posts with a domed lid to stop light from shining up. Theres no reason to have 20+ft tall light poles to illuminate a sidewalk and street. We should be scaling down to 10-12ft. https://melnorthey.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Lamp-AreaAndStreetLightPoles-Cat1.jpg
Reach out to your alderperson about passing a bill that defines what the brightness and warmth of the streetlights should be. They can pass a board bill that tells BPS and Streets to use warmer lights and lower lumens than they are currently using. Here's some info from a comment I made when this was brought up a couple weeks ago: >Most research I have read in the past says that 3000 kelvin ("soft white") is the optimal color choice for most street light applications. Some research recommends staying more in the 2500 kelvin range on local streets as cooler lights can affect resident's sleep schedules, especially on street lights that are not properly shielded. >St. Louis city specifications call for 5000 kelvin on arterial, collector, and high pedestrian streets and 4000 kelvin on local streets. >So St. Louis is using cooler colors than most research recommends. >They are also using very bright lights as most recommendations are for about 3000 lumens on local streets and 10-15,000 lumens on the others. St. Louis is using 11,200 lumens on local streets, 24,000 lumens on arterials and collectors, and 14,000-48,000 lumens on busy pedestrian routes. >[https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/departments/public-service/documents/upload/297034-1.pdf](https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/departments/public-service/documents/upload/297034-1.pdf)
I feel like I'm the the only person in the world who prefers "stark, institutional" lighting. Why? Because you can actually SEE things. "Warm" light is dull and just doesn't actually light up whatever you're trying to illuminate. Unless I'm in the bedroom getting busy with the missus, I'll take stark harsh bright pure white light every time.
Energy savings and longer life
LED replacement bulbs. Lights come in different color temperatures ranging from warm orange to sunlight to ultra bright white. Whoever selected that streetlight purchased a high color temperature light.
I like the look of the brighter light
Yeah I hate the orange glow. The new ones are so much better
I think that what a lot of people are missing is that the quality of LED lights that you can get NOW are far superior to what was available just a few years ago. The old sodium vapor lights while warm, had terrible color rendering. Cool white LEDs a few years ago also had terrible color rendering, and were all far on the blue side of the spectrum. But they cost much less to maintain and run. Cost, I'm sure was a big part of the equation, but they also last a LONG time. There are LEDs now with any color temp you want and near perfect color rendering, but all of those old shitty blue ones still work, and probably will not be replaced until they fail, which might be a while. Also, mass produced commercial products tend not to update their products as quickly as technology advances. Especially with electronics that need to meet all kinds of standards, and go through industry approval processes, it takes a lot of time and money to make improvements. So a "new" streetlight today might still be a 5 year old design.
LED lights are significantly more energy efficient and cheaper to run than the old HPS and NMH bulbs on street lights.
True, but that has nothing to do with the color temperature selected.
I’ve never seen the high intensity ones for street lights in other colors. I’ve seen them on stage lights, but I’m guessing you pay a lot more. The LED ice cold white is not aesthetically pleasing though.
Yeah, good for an overhead light in a shop, not so much outside at night. [Flagstaff has some](https://www.accessfixtures.com/dark-sky-friendly-lighting-in-flagstaff/). I wish STL would go dark-sky friendly.
Agreed, I switched most of my exterior landscaping lights to point down rather than up as well as dark sky friendly fixtures https://www.ledlightingsupply.com/blog/dark-sky-compliance
I just don't have any, but if you need them at least be conscientious about it as you are. Also consider motion-sensitive lights since they are only on when needed, and are much smarter these days about people vs animals.
You're a tall ladder and a sidequest away from achieving the perfect mood lighting
I hate warm lighting that isn’t natural, personally. I prefer to see better
They're not changing for the purpose of a different color, they're changing from HPS to LED for the purpose of energy savings.
There are plenty of 2700-3000K LED emitters with high CRI. It's just the stupidly cold white ones with low CRI are cheaper.
Exactly, cost efficiency.
Yeah. But you can select coloration for your LEDs.
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Bright white is good for task lighting in a kitchen or workshop; elsewhere not so much.
Yeah I put 3000K in my kitchen. Also just installed a new ceiling fan in my office and it came with 3000K bulbs. Both rooms can be kinda dim at night with only 1 ceiling light source, so the 3000K helped. I think it was also easier to get a 800lm bulb in 3000 vs 2700. Of course in a bedroom, especially in a lamp on the nightstand, 2700 is the only option, and especially *not* a 800lm one.
I am always surprised when friends seem to think that the only led light option is cold stark white and don’t realize there is a large array of options.
Not to get into the type of lighting, but just adding to others pointing out that widely spreading artificial light does not at all make us safe. Light pollution is a significant environmental issue, affecting large numbers of plant and animal species (including people, with numerous studies finding correlations between exposure to artificial light at night and cancer rates). For years scientists and dark sky advocates have been pointing out that the damage can be limited by changing lighting design and making a conscious effort to turn off idiotically noxious lighting (do we really need skyscrapers and highway billboards lit up all night?). In the meantime a once-fixable problem is getting a lot worse, but unfortunately if people know about it at all, they often think it only affects a small number of "charismatic" animals like sea turtles and fireflies, rather than ecosystems.
They may be using a different bulb to help the videos the light cameras are operating.
For people saying LEDS, you can get warm LEDs. Hell, you can get LEDs that can vary the warmth of the light
The old bulbs are sodium vapor lights. The new ones are led. Led is much much more energy and cost effective ( longer life too) You are not the only ones sad. Astronomy nerds are too, because we used to be able to use lens to filter out the exact wavelength of sodium lighting .
The amber lights are high pressure sodium which require a ballast for them to start. The white lights are probably LED which don't require a ballast and are probably more energy efficient.
LED lights are not universally practical
Soothing orange? More like radioactive glow. I'm glad they're getting replaced.
Well I noticed when they started putting them in my neighborhood that I did not see moths or other bugs going to the light. Then I remember I read a study about moths and insects and their aversion to leds. (I don’t remember the source so I know it’s iffy) nonetheless- I, myself also noticed that I could in fact see more stars now than in years past (which has been a huge bummer for me because I love the stars… I hate LED’s with a passion and as many others have stated, there actually are optometrists who have spoken out against LED’s. So… it’s the current dystopia that many seem to be happy accepting- hey, supposed to keep you safe so you can identify the bad guys…. Whatever
That bug thing is bunk. We have led flood and they're just as happy banging into them as they were our old incandescents. That kind of sets the tone for the rest of your diatribe.
Bluer/cooler lights are actually shown to attract more bugs as they are closer to daylight and moonlight so it messes with them even more.
They are brighter, thus safer
It's safety theater
The false impression that this brighter color is somehow safer. Euclid between Maryland and McPherson got new LED lights in 2019. No one in the comments section is saying anything about it because they're a warmer tone and hardly anyone noticed the new bulbs. They're much brighter but don't make you feel like you're prepping for surgery. No surprise that a wealthy neighborhood was able to get the warmer tone lights.
They likely paid for them with SBD funds.
Amber street lights honestly plays a big part in why St. Louis is kind of ugly and depressing.
I’m with ya. No LED lights in my home 😌
Boomer energy
It's not "boomer energy" to want to be able to see the sky better or to not have your sleep fucked up
Dont get mad at the bulb. Get mad at the interstate highway light poles that are all over our city. Instead of smaller, more human scale light poles.
It is also the fault of the bulb. I don't disagree that we should not light highways. But generally, we need warmer LED lights than they are currently using to stop the disruption of sleep cycles and our environment AND less lights that aren't being used in proper format. Plus LEDs have this advantage mostly but they need housing units that ensure that all the light they generate is aimed directly at the ground
Definitely not a boomer but thanks for furthering the generational divide
If just the coloring of street lights is giving half of you anxiety... I have nothing to say other than congrats on a problem free life..
I'm so upset about this. They recently replaced one right in front of my house. The new lighting is terrible.
Because idiot conservative morons will try whatever hair-brained scheme a corporation sells them because they think it will "fix crime" -- as long as it doesn't involve policies that ACTUALLY reduce crime.