It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 11:14 am

All times are UTC






Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 744 posts ] 


Author Message
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Dec 19, 2019 11:05 pm 
Offline
Member
Random avatar

Joined: Mon Jan 03, 2011 7:31 pm
Posts: 612
Images: 36
I would have thought due to the nature of them; smart motorways would have full lighting for safety reasons? We have so far managed to escape them up in the North East and with not needing to go further South than Leeds/Bradford for a while I’ve only used the M62 which is lit on its smart section.


Top
 Profile  Personal album 
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Apr 12, 2020 4:50 pm 
Offline
Member
User avatar

Joined: Thu Nov 12, 2009 8:46 pm
Posts: 540
Images: 11
Location: Colchester, Essex
In April 2012, Phosco152 wrote:
Savour this while you can. It probably won't be long before the SOX catenary lighting on the M1 south of the M25 is replaced.

The view looking northbound, just south of J6 of the M1 this afternoon.
Image

Image

In April 2012, Alex wrote:
These have survived for longer than I envisaged, and I hope it stays this way. Am I right in thinking that these are the last surviving catenary lights in the UK? The catenary lighting north of the M1 was replaced with Sapphires in conjunction with the road widening, but thankfully can still be seen on Google Street View: navigate along at your leisure.

In April 2012, sotonsteve wrote:
This is the last catenary lighting left on a motorway. There is also catenary lighting on the A4 and A30 in west London.

In April 2012, Urbis Saturn Land wrote:
Now that is how you light a motorway! Shame it is the last motorway stretch of catenary lighting. Will this last stretch on the M1 make it to Twenty-Thirteen, I hope it does.

In September 2018, A13James wrote:
I’ve just found out that all the SOX lighting on the M1 between J5 and 6A has been fully switched off since last week. That includes the catenary section.
It’s done very well to last this long, but it looks like the catenary may finally be at the end of its life  :cry:

In addition, the slip roads of J6 are now lit by LED lanterns. A sign of things to come for the main carriageway potentially?

In February 2019, Paianni wrote:
The columns with (mostly) MA60s on the sliproads of M25 J21/M1 J6a are being changed for new columns with LED lanterns similar to those used at M1 J6. Nothing has been done about the missing bridge deck columns. The catenary lights are still in situ, from the angle I was driving I could not tell whether they were being replaced.

In May 2019, Paianni wrote:
Judging by traffic camera stills, at least some lighting from M1 J4-6a seems to be working once more. I have to take a trip there to capture footage at some point.

EDIT: Turns out its only an assortment of SON between the Sandy Lane bridge and J5.

A non-essential day trip from Colchester in Essex to Davidstow in Cornwall to pick up an Ebay win just four weekends ago (how life has changed!) allowed me the opportunity to have a look at this installation of catenary lighting, perhaps for the last time. The evening had set in by the time I had arrived, and the lighting was not working - the above replies suggesting this has been the case since at least September 2018.

Image
The M1 motorway as seen from Bucknalls Lane bridge in Watford in March 2020.

Image
The switch-off of the catenary lighting appears to be part of a wider switch-off of lighting on the M1 in this area, with these Philips MA60s also switched off. This is the view looking towards London from the other side of the bridge, also taken in March 2020.

Image
Although we will never see them in light again, it is still possible to get excellent photographs of this installation during the day (coronavirus-permitting of course). This photograph was taken from the same bridge in January 2012.

I have also been blessed to see these lanterns back in the day when they were in light. Performance has been patchy over the last 10 or so years - on some occasions many of the "groups" of Phosco P415 lanterns between two adjacent columns have been out of light, whereas on other occasions only one group of lanterns was not working. December 2012 was one such occasion (only one group of lanterns out of light), and the pictures below were taken then. Sadly I have never seen the installation with every lantern in light - perhaps not a surprise given the age of the installation.

Image
This is the best example of a night shot that I have of this installation, once again taken from the Bucknalls Lane bridge. Photograph taken in December 2012.

Image
On this occasion, I was also around to witness the switch-on of the section between junction 6 and the bridge, which was certainly a sight to behold! Photograph taken in December 2012.

It is a shame that this lighting is not being used any more - a decision perhaps hastened by Philips ceasing the production of low pressure sodium bulbs.

We are lucky that this lighting has lasted perhaps 10 years, even 20 years longer than we may have expected. And coronavirus-permitting, it is still possible to get excellent photographs of this installation during the day.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Mon Apr 13, 2020 11:58 am 
Offline
Site Administration
User avatar

Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:38 pm
Posts: 3402
Images: 27
Location: Salisbury
With the west London sections gone, this really the last of its kind.  :cry:


Top
 Profile  Personal album 
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:30 pm 
Offline
Site Administration
User avatar

Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:38 pm
Posts: 3402
Images: 27
Location: Salisbury
In Dec 2019 Phosco152 wrote:
Smart motorways works on the M23 has seen all of the legacy lighting removed at its interchange with the M25.

New verge lighting has been installed, but at the moment it is limited to a much shorter distance - just the slips themselves. The scene today in atrocious weather - dash cam image.

Image


Well in much better weather, the exact same location now looks like this:

Image

New "jumbo" size Holophane Vmaxes have been installed. The central reservation lighting has now been extended and now starts approximately 1 mile before the junction.


Top
 Profile  Personal album 
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Jul 23, 2020 7:48 pm 
Offline
Member
User avatar

Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:27 pm
Posts: 1814
Images: 200
Different approaches by different design teams evidently. Compare that with the M3/M25 junction, where all existing lighting on the M3 main carriageway was removed, and the slip road lighting was truncated back to where it was away from the M3 main carriageway. Also, M4 around Reading, where amongst other things, the lighting at J10 is now solely on the slip roads and no longer on the M4 main carriageway, and was never on the A329M main carriageway.


Top
 Profile  Personal album 
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Tue Aug 04, 2020 3:22 pm 
Offline
Formerly Paspie
User avatar

Joined: Sun Feb 05, 2012 2:29 pm
Posts: 114
I hope they keep this rather neat MS1 gantry.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Wed Oct 28, 2020 7:55 pm 
Offline
Random avatar

Joined: Wed Oct 28, 2020 7:23 pm
Posts: 4
Hello everybody, new member here so please give me time to get my bearings of this site if any mistakes occur.

I've just been looking through the local news websites etc and found an article about a crane fire on the M62: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk ... s-18652343

It looks like at the time of the report the eastbound side of the Scammoden M62 (Jct 22(?)) has once again been relit, from Urbis Ampera's to ASD Diamond Highway. I do not know how far this relighting has gone or if the westbound side has been too. If this is a relighting scheme my goodness what a waste- those Ampera's were installed late 2016-2017 so hardly burnt in!

Sorry that this is a ranty first post, it does bug me how much is unnecessarily replaced, I think of the ZX3's on the M60 that are past their 20th birthday, or dare I mention on here Iridums that lasted years on the Dartford Crossing. I do hope that Highways England is just trailing some new ASD diamonds, (I am referencing this post off a couple of grainy pictures) but if the whole stretch of Ampera's are taken down (I know they are susceptible to crashing down to the ground) on safety grounds then what an absolute waste of money spent!


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2020 9:01 pm 
Offline
Member
User avatar

Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:27 pm
Posts: 1814
Images: 200
Highways England can be very wasteful when it comes to street lighting. Down my way, one location is soon to get its third generation of LED lighting. First, on the A3 slip roads by Petersfield Services they replaced some Philips SGS203s with Philips Iridium2 LEDs when the SGS203s were just over 20 years old but still serviceable. They then replaced the Philips Iridium2 LEDs with Holophane V-Max lanterns a couple of years ago, even though the Iridium2s were working fine. Soon they will be doing a column replacement scheme and installing new lanterns on the new columns. Second, on the A31 near Corfe Mullen, they installed a mix of Philips SpeedStars and Lumas on existing columns several years ago. A couple of years ago, despite no issues with the existing LED lighting, they replaced all the lanterns with Holophane V-Max lanterns, and recently they have just replaced all the columns and fitted different Holophane V-Max lanterns to them. There are other examples. Meanwhile, at many other locations, lighting columns are literally collapsing onto the road and having to be chopped down en-masse, and they're doing bugger all to replace them. In the case of the A27 north of Portsmouth, lighting columns started failing and being removed in 2005, and they took all of them down in 2007. 13 years later, still no replacements, and you might think they aren't going to put back the lighting, but the lighting design of new columns on slip roads is indicative suggests otherwise.

Highways England have also had significant issues with lanterns falling from columns, with Philips Lumas and Urbis Amperas being particularly badly affected, but have also had failures with Philips Iridium2s and Phosco P860s. Whilst to a degree some manufacturing defects were identified, there is a belief amongst some of us on UKASTLE that some of the installations were just done badly, such as over tightening of grub screws stripping threads or fracturing castings, or spigots not even being slipped over brackets properly. So, a mix of "they don't make them like they used to" combined with poor workmanship from contractors. It's interesting how many street lighting failures Highways England has compared with local authorities. Lanterns falling from columns doesn't seem to have impacted local authorities like Highways England despite using the same products, and falling columns is practically unheard of, unlike with Highways England where it seems to be frequent. Also, mass lighting outages. Rare to see outages on local authority roads, but commonplace with Highways England.


Top
 Profile  Personal album 
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2020 10:01 pm 
Offline
Random avatar

Joined: Wed Oct 28, 2020 7:23 pm
Posts: 4
I believe this is the first mass use of the ASD Diamonds on the UK motorway network (?) in not a very forgiving environment/location on the moors! I’ve known Diamonds to be very reliable however in my opinion glairy, so it will be interesting to find how the high power versions work out. Nice to see the UK made lanterns appear but as I said, LED for LED, in a time where we are told to be as sustainable as possible?


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:13 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2020 11:45 am
Posts: 22
The Highways Agency is extremely wasteful with lighting.  Three examples come straight to mind, the M62 of course; I was shocked to hear the Amperas have been replaced with ASD Diamonds already, they only replaced Sapphires a few years ago, which in turn only replaced ZX3s a few years before !  I remember a section on the M1 near Wakefield that was lit with Siemens Broadways was entirely replaced with Sapphires on new columns, then just 2 or so years later, that section was entirely replaced with Lumas on more new columns !  And finally, a small section of the A1 near Newcastle that had aluminium columns with Iridiums, those Iridums were replaced with Sapphires, which have now been replaced with either Amperas or Lumas on new not even aluminium columns completely.

I just don't understand why they do this, it's an enormous waste.


Top
 Profile  
 

Display posts from previous:  Sort by  


Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 744 posts ] 

All times are UTC



You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Jump to:  

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 25 guests



Search for: