street lighting, how does it work

[Lectrician]

I'm not at home for Christmas, and today saw a row street lights with the stubby aerials. In the middle of the row was a domed sensor. It didn't look like a typical NEMA type.

I'm assuming these will all mesh together, being lead by the primary one, the primary one having a GSM connection or similar and able to report the energy usage, and be programmed and overridden remotely.

 

[bernardgreen]

I was once told emergency services can make traffic lights go to green when aproaching, so maybe your right.

Emergency Vehicles when using visual and audiable warnings have an exempton which allows the driver to treat red traffic lights as a "Give Way" sign hence there is no need for them to be able to change a red light to green for themselves. If they were to force a change to Green on their approach route then the Green Amber Red sequence for crossing traffic would need to be invoked. The time this takes is often longer than the time it would take for the vehicle to negotiate the junction using the exemption.

The risk of a driver jumping the Amber or Red after the Green phase for crossing traffic was unexpected shortened was considered higher than the risks of a trained driver using the exemption through a Red

It is possible in some areas for control rooms to alter the phasing of some traffic lights to speed traffic flow along routes that emergency services are using when there is a major incident with many emergency service vehicles involved.

 

[Lectrician]

My neighbour was at the front of a dual lane of traffic, on reds. An ambulance was coming down through the middle, and to let it through, she went forward and to the left around 3-4 meter. The ambulance shot through, all was fine.

She got a penalty notice for jumping a red light (camera), and took it to court, rather than pay. She lost, and was told no matter what happened, she shouldn't of jumped the lights, the ambulance would of had to have waited.

 

[Steve]

There's an ambulance station not far from where I live, and the first junction the ambulances encounter is signalled, and they approach on the minor road to the junction. The lights facing the minor road take ages to turn green at the best of times. I've seen people get fed up and run the red light when there's nobody about (apart from me watching them). I've seen a diagram of the signal network there and it appears to have an induction loop to let the lights know a vehicle is there, but it appears to have little effect. However, of particular interest is a "signal call button" in the ambulance station. It seems either the ambulance driver hits the button on the way out, or the controller in the station pushes the button once the ambulance is dispatched. Again, I'm not sure what effect this has on the signals, I would assume a slight delay is built in so that only when the ambulance approaches the signal does the signal change - the station is about 500yds away.

Doncaster MBC is fitting LEDs everywhere now. They fitted one on my street on its own to replace an expired SOX light. I recognise the fitting as the same as Rotherham MBC fits on their side roads, and they are excellent, great spread of light and output brilliant for 20w. However, DMBC seems to have scrapped fitting these and now fit god awful fittings that create little pools of light. They have fitted them all down my mum's road and it seems to be very dark there now. As for control, they just seem to have their own sensors. Sheffield city council claim to have individual control over all their fittings, and indeed when I drove there at night the LEDs seemed somewhat dimmer, but I couldn't prove it. They have what look like little stubby aerials on top of them. Not much taller than a NEMA photocell.

 

[eveares]

I know in my area (East Surrey), a lot of new and modern street light has a little Arial on the top of it. I have always assumed that a signal is sent out from somewhere to turn them all on and off. Each light might even have it's own ID on the network so it can be controlled individually. Now for some reason, I occasionally see a street light on during the day; maybe some also have a built in photocell.

Below is a picture of one of my street's street lights:

Street Light Arial

• eveares
• 26 Dec 2015

Here is a bit of info about them and faults for street lights in Surrey can apparently be reported here.

 

[JBR]

My neighbour was at the front of a dual lane of traffic, on reds. An ambulance was coming down through the middle, and to let it through, she went forward and to the left around 3-4 meter. The ambulance shot through, all was fine.

She got a penalty notice for jumping a red light (camera), and took it to court, rather than pay. She lost, and was told no matter what happened, she shouldn't of jumped the lights, the ambulance would of had to have waited.

A disgusting lack of common sense on the part of those responsible in that court.
The poor patient in the ambulance, perhaps suffering a heart attack or stroke would, presumably, have been of no concern to them.

 

[bernardgreen]

Technically she had committed an offence, leniency could have been applied. It depends on when she jumped the red light.

If the emergency vehicle was directly behind her when she jumped the red the court should have been lenient on the basis that drivers of crossing traffic would be aware of the blues and twos and alert for vehicles jumping the red.

If she had gone across the red when the emergency vehicle was some distance behind her then her actions would not have have been anticipated by drivers of crossing traffic.

 

[Adam_151]

My neighbour was at the front of a dual lane of traffic, on reds. An ambulance was coming down through the middle, and to let it through, she went forward and to the left around 3-4 meter. The ambulance shot through, all was fine.

She got a penalty notice for jumping a red light (camera), and took it to court, rather than pay. She lost, and was told no matter what happened, she shouldn't of jumped the lights, the ambulance would of had to have waited.

As Bernard has said, technically you shouldn't do it, but bad form for the court to upheld it in the situation. Can I ask though, did she go right through the lights, or did she move into the junction and over to one side to let the ambulance past and only continue through the junction after it when she had green / reverse back behind the line if the cars behind had seen whats happening and left space.

It is different however for Police car if you can see them gesturing in the mirror for you to get out the way. One is permitted to ignore traffic signals if requested to by an officier in uniform. They would be very reluctant to do this however, because if you went through and got hit by on-comming traffic, they would be in hot water, so this would be a very rare occurance

 

[Lectrician]

I know she said she just went forward and left. She was then in the junction, so I would guess she went on, behind the Ambulance, as would of been in the way of other traffic. The photo shows the ambulance, and her car to the left, behind it, the number plate only *just* viewable on the bottom of the photo! There is also another car there too, but you can only see the roof!

 

[JBR]

I know she said she just went forward and left. She was then in the junction, so I would guess she went on, behind the Ambulance, as would of been in the way of other traffic. The photo shows the ambulance, and her car to the left, behind it, the number plate only *just* viewable on the bottom of the photo! There is also another car there too, but you can only see the roof!

Perhaps she should have stayed put until the lights changed to green, even though she would have been an obstruction.
Remember, the courts appear to live by box-ticking rather than employing common sense.