The first street lights with light emitting diodes appeared in Faubourg St. John about two years ago. This past week many more were installed in the area in and around the 3200 block of Esplanade and the businesses along Ponce de Leon. These brighter, whiter lights are significantly better and last longer.
Faubourg St. John has received excellent response from the City on a number of issues including street lighting. While there are always those who will gripe, moan and complain that they didn’t get what they wanted when they wanted it, there is no quick-fix solution. You have to call 311 about problems you notice and you have to follow up on the issue.
There is no City employee running around in a pickup truck looking for streetlights that are out, potholes that need filling or storm drains that need to be pumped out.
The City needs you to work WITH them and call 311 whenever you see something that needs to be taken care of… and follow up. http://nola.gov/311/
Call 311 anytime you see a streetlight out. For more about what the City of New Orleans is doing about streetlights in New Orleans, please read below.
The Department of Public Works oversees more than 54,000 streetlights, including those on Interstate highways and State roads. The streetlight system includes fixtures, poles, pole bases, wiring, circuitry, and junction boxes. It is comprised of 15 types of streetlight fixtures, 19 types of poles, 6 types of lamps, and 15 types of bulb wattages, including steel and concrete poles, residential lighting poles and fixtures, and a diverse collection of historical poles and fixtures.
When the Landrieu Administration took office in 2010 there were over 16,000 streetlight outages in New Orleans (over 29%). Since then, the City has fixed over 43,000 streetlights. In 2012, the City used one-time federal stimulus funding to convert over 17,000 streetlights to energy-efficient Light Emitting Diode (LED) lights. Over 30% of the streetlight system has already been converted.
LED streetlights reduce energy usage, reduce maintenance and operational costs, and improve system reliability. Benefits of energy efficient LED lights include:
- Design Life of 7-10 years versus to 2-3 years for conventional lights.
- Use 30-50% less energy versus conventional lights
- Provide the same or better level of illumination with a whiter hue light
- LED lights can be directed to illuminate specific areas
Traditional streetlights cast a yellow-tinted hue, as you can see to the left on Magazine St. LED streetlights cast a white-tinted hue, as you can see the recently-converted lights on Magazine St.
On July 1, 2014, the City began a major streetlight upgrade and improvement initiative. A total of $16.4 million will be used to continue converting conventional streetlights to energy-efficient LED streetlights and perform needed capital repairs while a long-term, sustainable funding source is identified.
Energy Smart Streetlight Conversion | Under this program, the City is using $14.7 million in one-time Energy Smart funding to convert traditional streetlights into energy-efficient streetlights. The Energy Smart Streetlight Conversion Program will convert approximately 19,800 streetlights to energy-efficient LEDs. 15-crews will be working to convert about 600 streetlights per week into energy efficient streetlights over the next 12 months. Work will be performed on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis based on:
- NOLA for Life focus areas
- Place-Based Planning areas
- Proximity to NOLA for Life or Place-Based Planning areas
- Types of streetlight fixtures currently in place in each neighborhood
- Number of LED streetlights already converted in a given neighborhood
- Amount of construction already planned in a given neighborhood over next 12 months.
Under this program, the City will use $1.7 million in City Capital and Infrastructure Trust funding to perform permanent streetlight system upgrades and replacements including:
- Upgrading or replacing system infrastructure including conduits, conductors, upgrading or upsizing feed points, group relays, fixtures, and other capital improvements
- Rehabilitating streetlight pole components including painting of hardware components, and/or replacement/upgrade of pole components such as support arms, poles, bases or foundations
- Re-setting knocked down streetlights
- Instaling new streetlight poles
The first priorities under this program are to improve street lighting along Interstate-10, Interstate-510 and Interstate-610, and upgrade critical system infrastructure to increase system reliability.
View a larger version of the conversion map by clicking here.
Planned Conversions
| Neighborhood – Westbank | District | Scheduled Conversion | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Behrman | C | Complete | |
| McDonogh | C | Complete | |
| Tall Timbers – Brechtel | C | Complete | |
| US Naval Base | C | Complete | |
| Whitney | C | Complete | |
| Algiers Point | C | TBD | Planning |
| Old Aurora | C | TBD | Planning |
| New Aurora/English Turn | C | TBD | Planning |
| Neighborhood – East Bank | District | Scheduled Conversion | Status |
| Seventh Ward | CD | July 2014 | Complete |
| Gert Town | AB | July 2014 | Complete |
| Central City | B | July 2014 | Complete |
| St. Roch | CD | July 2014 | Complete |
| BW Cooper | B | July 2014 | Complete |
| Little Woods | E | July 2014 | Complete |
| Hollygrove | A | July 2014 | Complete |
| Gentilly Woods | D | July 2014 | Complete |
| Mid City | AB | July 2014 | Complete |
| St Bernard | D | July 2014 | Complete |
| Broadmoor | AB | July-Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Dixon | A | July-Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Gentilly Terrace | D | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Fairgrounds | AD | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Filmore | AD | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Lower Ninth Ward | E | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Bywater | D | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Milan | B | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Dillard | D | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Read Blvd East | E | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Leonidas | A | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Holy Cross | E | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Read Blvd West | E | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| St Claude | CD | Aug 2014 | Complete |
| Treme-Lafitte | CD | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| West Lake Forest | E | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Marlyville-Fontainebleau | AB | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Pontchartrain Park | D | Sept 2014 | In progress |
| Pines Village | D | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Milneburg | D | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Lower Garden District & St Thomas Development | B | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Desire Area | D | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Tulane-Gravier | B | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Uptown | B | Sept 2014 | Complete |
| Plum Orchard | E | Oct 2014 | In progress |
| Marigny | C | Oct 2014 | Complete |
| City Park | A | Oct 2014 | Complete |
| East Riverside | B | Oct 2014 | Complete |
| Audubon | A | Oct 2014 | In progress |
| Irish Channel | B | Oct 2014 | In progress |
| Black Pearl | A | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| Lake Terrace & Oaks | D | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| East Carrollton | A | Nov 2014 | Planning |
| Lakeshore-Lake Vista | D | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| West Riverside | AB | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| Lakewood | A | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| Garden District | B | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| Bayou St John | A | Nov 2014 | In progress |
| Lakeview | A | Nov 2014 | Planning |
| St Anthony | D | Dec 2014 | Planning |
| Viavant | E | TBD | Planning |
| Village de Lest | E | TBD | Planning |
| Navarre | A | TBD | Planning |
| Freret | B | TBD | Planning |
| Iberville | BC | TBD | Planning |
| Florida Development/Area | F | TBD | Planning |
| Lake Catherine | E | TBD | Planning |
| Touro | B | TBD | Planning |
| West End | A | TBD | Planning |
| CBD & French Quarter | C | TBD | Planning |
