lighting on motorways

I have noticed that in recent weeks that many of the lights have been switched off on the mainline at junctions.


Does anyone have the background to this?

Seth Brundle

Which motorway?
Does it really matter as presumably you and other drivers will have lights on?

OldMrBrennan83

Kason Tender Baton wrote: »

I have noticed that in recent weeks that many of the lights have been switched off on the mainline at junctions.


Does anyone have the background to this?

Part of some EU thing on saving energy. Someone else (Ceilingfly or L1011 maybe?) has posted more in detail before so I'd say they could tell you more if they see this.

AugustusMinimus

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Which motorway?
Does it really matter as presumably you and other drivers will have lights on?

What an idiotic comment. Why do we have street lighting at all. Sure people should carry torches instead.

godtabh

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

What an idiotic comment. Why do we have street lighting at all. Sure people should carry torches instead.

Its not. How many roads in ireland are unlit?

Lights should only be urban areas.

G_R

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

What an idiotic comment. Why do we have street lighting at all. Sure people should carry torches instead.

We have street lighting for pedestrians who don't have 2 headlights installed on the front of them.

Motorways don't have people walking on them and there is plenty of advance signage in place which means that street lights are not nesescary on motorways

punisher5112

On motorways there are way too many lights together.

Seth Brundle

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

Sure people should carry torches instead.

Should we expect pedestrians on motorways (with or without a torch)?

punisher5112

punisher5112 wrote: »

On motorways there are way too many lights together.

I must admit that I did find that night driving on the motorway that as you approached a junction it was lit up like town centre.
Then as you drive away from it,your night vision was destroyed and needed time to readjust.


Now it is much easier on the eyes when driving through the junctions.


I am sure that there are still a number that need switching off J13 in Athlone for example, I assume it is work in progress.

punisher5112

I honestly think all cars should from now on come with LED or xenon as standard.

The halogen lights are pure Sh1te.

My Octavia has projector style lamps and shouldn't be allowed if halogen bulbs are used they are desperate.

The problem with incorrectly adjusted lights is worse today than it used to be in the past.

punisher5112

Kason Tender Baton wrote: »

The problem with incorrectly adjusted lights is worse today than it used to be in the past.

That's when dimbats put lamps that their car isn't designed for though.

Nct should take care of most but those that do what I say including many taxis I see should be done by the Gardai.

Flesh Gorden

Kason Tender Baton wrote: »

The problem with incorrectly adjusted lights is worse today than it used to be in the past.

The newer Audi's have an odd flaw whereby on a bend, it appears that you're being briefly flashed by the driver.

Still though, it's nothing compared to the old reflector lamps, that were common before projector headlights.
Gone are the days of meeting some dope in a 90's Ford with Night Breakers blinding everyone.

Or the BMW Halo lights, which if you were walking on a dark road, were very disorientating when one was approaching from behind, as you'd have the ring of light in front of you.


Personally I'd be in favour of a larger rollout of Cat's Eyes, esp on the M8 where the road markings are worn off
and nervous drivers keep their full beam on regardless of cars approaching or in front of them.

Actual motorway lighting should only be there when you are hitting city boundaries or major interchanges like up in Limerick.

Del2005

Flesh Gorden wrote: »

T

nervous drivers keep their full beam on regardless of cars approaching or in front of them.

It's not nervous drivers, it's ignorant people who don't know or care that full beam blinds approaching motorists. Happens on motorways with good cats eyes.

Richmond Ultra

As your on the topic of motorways, does any organisation use the blue numbers you see at the side of the road e.g. m18 s 50 etc, when passing Galway to Shannon.

I rang an emergency services a few weeks back and was told they don't use that. A friend also told me that he had a similar experience.

highwaymaniac

To answer the OP, TII have published a new lighting design document in August. New grade separated junctions and interchanges are now only to be lit for a distance of 60m either side of the intersection with the minor road eg dumbell roundabouts. No lighting on the mainline at all outside urban areas except for compact grade separated junctions and free flow interchanges.


So I would imagine that they have applied the same standard to existing junctions. As to the reasons behind the new standard, most likely they have done a study which determined that for lighting outside of these areas the costs outweigh the saftey benefit.

http://www.tiipublications.ie/library/DN-LHT-03038-03.pdf

Alkers

highwaymaniac wrote:

To answer the OP, TII have published a new lighting design document in August. New grade separated junctions and interchanges are now only to be lit for a distance of 60m either side of the intersection with the minor road eg dumbell roundabouts. No lighting on the mainline at all outside urban areas except for compact grade separated junctions and free flow interchanges.

Exactly this, the newer sections of motorway have been built to the new standard, reduced lighting footprint and have operated perfectly safely since installed. Now they are applying the new standard to existing junctions by first turning off the lights and then at a later date removing the posts
Mainly an energy saving measure but also somewhat conunter-intuitively in studies street lighting has been found to result in an increase in incidents as drivers feel safer and travel and greater speeds.

ted1

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

What an idiotic comment. Why do we have street lighting at all. Sure people should carry torches instead.

Cars have string head lights

G_R

Richmond Ultra wrote: »

As your on the topic of motorways, does any organisation use the blue numbers you see at the side of the road e.g. m18 s 50 etc, when passing Galway to Shannon.

I rang an emergency services a few weeks back and was told they don't use that. A friend also told me that he had a similar experience.

The numbers on the side are just the number of km to the end of the road.

If you tell an ambulance you're between junction 9 & 10, just at the 70km mark you can be sure they'll use it. Why wouldn't they

Seth Brundle

ted1 wrote: »

Cars have string head lights

...and yet they still manage to hit pedestrians, cyclists and other vulnerable road users!

ted1

Seth Brundle wrote: »

...and yet they still manage to hit pedestrians, cyclists and other vulnerable road users!

None of which are allowed on motorways

BelfastVanMan

ted1 wrote: »

Seth Brundle wrote: »

...and yet they still manage to hit pedestrians, cyclists and other vulnerable road users!

None of which are allowed on motorways

This is what happens when idiots walk up motorways, dressed in dark, with no high-vis, then people complain that "motorways are dangerous"....


Yeah. In the same way that I wouldn't recommend going for a walk in a food processor....

I like to think of it merely as Natural Selection at work.

Seth Brundle

ted1 wrote: »

None of which are allowed on motorways

I agree - my post was responding to this...

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

What an idiotic comment. Why do we have street lighting at all. Sure people should carry torches instead.

chewed

What's the story with Cats' eyes that stop working? Does the reflector light need to be changed or just cleaned when they stop lighting up? I see it on a lot of new road developments around Meath, where after a year or 2, a lot of them don't light up and nothing ever seems to be done to fix them!

chewed

chewed wrote: »

What's the story with Cats' eyes that stop working? Does the reflector light need to be changed or just cleaned when they stop lighting up? I see it on a lot of new road developments around Meath, where after a year or 2, a lot of them don't light up and nothing ever seems to be done to fix them!

The original cat's eyes had a self cleaning system that wiped the lens when a vehicle ran over them.

I don't think the current ones do that.

punisher5112

chewed wrote: »

What's the story with Cats' eyes that stop working? Does the reflector light need to be changed or just cleaned when they stop lighting up? I see it on a lot of new road developments around Meath, where after a year or 2, a lot of them don't light up and nothing ever seems to be done to fix them!

They tend to pop out.

It's a reflector and there are much better lasting ones then the road studs(cats eyes)

They don't tend to last very long with such heavy traffic using the road.

chewed

punisher5112 wrote: »

They tend to pop out.

It's a reflector and there are much better lasting ones then the road studs(cats eyes)

They don't tend to last very long with such heavy traffic using the road.

I can't understand why they started putting the cats' eyes on the actual lane itself. They used to always place them on the yellow line. Traffic (especially wide trucks and buses) are more likely to drive over them when they're positioned on the lane. Is there are a reason why they do this nowadays?

punisher5112

chewed wrote: »

I can't understand why they started putting the cats' eyes on the actual lane itself. They used to always place them on the yellow line. Traffic (especially wide trucks and buses) are more likely to drive over them when they're positioned on the lane. Is there are a reason why they do this nowadays?

They would clog up with dirt as nothing drove over to clear them.

Del2005

chewed wrote: »

I can't understand why they started putting the cats' eyes on the actual lane itself. They used to always place them on the yellow line. Traffic (especially wide trucks and buses) are more likely to drive over them when they're positioned on the lane. Is there are a reason why they do this nowadays?

Mark the road lanes. Otherwise you could have someone driving in the middle of the road claiming that they are in the correct lane.

Richmond Ultra

G_R wrote: »

The numbers on the side are just the number of km to the end of the road.

If you tell an ambulance you're between junction 9 & 10, just at the 70km mark you can be sure they'll use it. Why wouldn't they

Thanks for the response.

I know that and supposedly the AA use them a lot for fixing cars etc but I was onto the roads policing unit to complain about a car swerving from lane to lane to be told that they don't use that marking. I thought they of all services would have a system to identify the marking.

The friend had a similar experience with the Gardai, they wanted to know the next junction so as they could get the car location and not the marking at the side of the road.

L1011

That just suggests the AA have adapted to the usefulness of them and the Guards basically haven't.

There's one advantage the AA have that makes it easier to - the AA will have some form of GIS system to locate the nearest free or next to be free patrol and it'll be quite easy to glue in chainage markers; an individual Garda car getting a radio call doesn't have that to show them where it is.