Ever since I saw a Residium lit in Micklefield lit up for the first time, in Micklefield a few years ago, I have thought this (and said it) a lot. With CFL lanterns like the Altra's, Jet's, etc, there really is no need for SON anymore on residential streets, and MH is now questionable.

The Hampshire madness continues.

Maunsell Way in Hedge End near Southampton has had a number of casual replacements done recently. The road is lit mostly with late 1980s Stainton hockeystick columns and Z9454s, but there have been a dozen or so casual replacements with the horrible 8m Stainton tubular steel columns and ZX3s that Hampshire currently have a liking for. A number of these casual replacements have been done next to traffic calming build-outs that were built back in 2004, although I did see three around one random side turning too. The new columns are in much the same positions as the old ones, give or take a couple of feet, so why on earth have they bothered with these replacements? The PFI will see the original columns along this road replaced within the next five years, so why is Hampshire picking at random columns along this road? If they wanted to 'improve' lighting levels around the build outs in the meantime then why couldn't they just replace the Z9454s with ZX3s and then wait for the PFI to do the rest?

Meanwhile, nearby there is a new crematorium under construction, and this has seen some of the original columns on the adjacent road replaced. However, for some reason Hampshire have replaced three or four of the columns but retained two random columns in amongst the bunch, just fitting new lanterns to them. Again, these older columns will qualify for replacement under the PFI, so what on earth is Hampshire up to?

Sounds crazy. A street here had most of the 1970s 8m columns replaced, with new ones and Sapphire 2s (flat glass) but for some reason they left two columns, and the old lanterns, which consists of a GEC Z9454 retrofit and a GR100. Why do councils do these things? The fact that new identification stickers have been applied to the 2 old columns show that they weren't forgotten. If they are willing to replace a newer column with SGS203, or even a 1970s column with a SGS203, then why not an old column with an old GR100. It makes no sense!

Increasingly nowadays councils disengage their brains and rely 100% on computers. When it comes to maintenance, I have seen two consecutive columns with brackets that have turned round 90 degrees in the wind. After a while, one of the columns had its bracket turned back the right way, but the neighbouring column was left untouched. How on earth do two columns next to each other with the same highly visible defect get treated so differently? I can only assume that only one of the columns was reported as being defective, so they only fixed the one that was reported as being defective and didn't bother touching the one that wasn't reported. That's my theory anyway. What's the point with scouting to identify issues nowadays? Councils suggest that they do nightly checks on street lighting every fortnight or month, yet problems manage to persist for months or years at a time. It's as if councils can only be a**** to fix a problem if Joe Public reports it.

I don't believe that Hampshire, Portsmouth or Southampton do nightly patrols.

Hampshire clearly don't check their street lights unless the public reports a fault first.
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By the end of January they had all been fixed.

They must all be group switched then.. and wot a load of tosh about dirt on the "sensor"...and doesn't explain why they took so long to fix when all it needed was a new photocell/2 part controller. Hmm 5 minute job and includes getting the bucket van set up if the cell is at "high level".

It could be that the celled lantern was under a tree which caused them all to dayburn. It's happened here. [but with one lantern] Either way, it seems like a fair few of the lanterns were dayburning and like you say, it would take 5 minutes to change the cell.

More progress on the A27 Havant bypass. There is now a new concrete central reservation that has been installed in the last 2 weeks from the A3(M) junction east to the Broadmarsh interchange. On top of this barrier are new galvanised hex section Stainton columns with T brackets and Urbis Sapphires, so very similar to what was installed a few hundred yards to the east except those columns have Iridiums. Most of the 10m slip road lighting on the Havant exit has now been installed although old columns now remain - The new 10m slip road columns are bigger versions of these:



When I went past this morning it was light so I'm not sure if the lighting is in operation yet.

Further east at the Fishbourne interchange there is a new casual hex Stainton hockey stick with of all things - a SGS203. The dreaded Selenium is another casual on an older column.

A Fontwell, more aluminium (10m versions of those in the picture) columns have appeared to replace road traffic casualties as they are now spread randomly about those junctions, but there is also another new Stainton hockey stick with a SGS203.

I saw these the other night, and I was left wondering why there are two sets of columns. Normally, a new set of columns is placed alongside the set of columns that they are replacing, so that one set of columns is always illuminating the road. However, all but a couple of random old columns were disconnected a few months back, so the road has been in near darkness but with both new and old columns sat doing nothing.