Britain Shuts Off 750,000 Streetlights With No Impact On Crime Or Crashes

Flash Modin writes: English cities are hard up for cash as the national government dolls out cuts. And in response, the country's councils — local governing bodies — have slashed costs by turning off an estimated 750,000 streetlights. Fans of the night sky and reduced energy usage are happy, but the move has also sparked a national debate. The Automobile Association claims six people have died as a direct result of dimming the lights. But a new study released Wednesday looked at 14 years of data from 63 local authorities across England and Wales and found that residents' chances of being attacked, robbed, or struck by a car were no worse on the darker streets.

Comments

Crooks are afraid of the dark, too

[boristdog]

And cars tend to have headlights.

I remember a study from the 90's that showed eliminating lights around schools at night actually reduced the number of break-ins at those schools. The reasoning was that a) most people are afraid of the dark and b) a ne'er-do-well would need a flashlight, which would be easy to spot in the darkness.

Re:Crooks are afraid of the dark, too

[Anonymous Coward]

And cars tend to have headlights.

I remember a study from the 90's that showed eliminating lights around schools at night actually reduced the number of break-ins at those schools. The reasoning was that a) most people are afraid of the dark and b) a ne'er-do-well would need a flashlight, which would be easy to spot in the darkness.

It's also found that motion sensing lights are more effective than ones that stay on all night long for similar reasons. The light suddenly coming on can scare away prowlers who who previous hidden in the dark plus it attracts attention when lights are suddenly switching on and off around a building that is known to be unoccupied.

Re:Crooks are afraid of the dark, too

[TheRaven64]

I used to walk home through a park. Except on cloudless nights with no moon, you got enough reflected light to be able to see quite clearly across it. Then there some some hysteria about the potential for being attacked (triggered by a flasher, who only exposed himself to people in broad daylight) and they added a row of streetlights along the side of the path. If you stood about 10m from the path, you were completely invisible to someone walking along it, but they were clearly visible to you for their entire trip across the park (as were any potential witnesses on the path). If someone actually wanted to attack people crossing the park, the lights made it a lot easier. It would only take a few seconds to hit someone and drag them out of the visible area.

Most streetlights are wasteful

[sjbe]

I see street lights as a waste of money.

Not just a waste of money. Most of them are a waste of fuel, serve no meaningful social purpose, create needless light pollution as well as emissions and waste resources in their creation and installation. We could eliminate vast numbers of street lights in all likelihood with no adverse effect at all while saving a lot of money and reducing pollution. I'm always astonished when I fly over a city at night how many empty parking lots, unoccupied buildings, unused streets and other things we pointlessly and wastefully light up.

Streetlights useful to remark road in bad weather

[SuperKendall]

I'm a fan of getting rid of streetlights but...

There is one way in which I can see they make things definitely less safe, and that is clearly indicating where the edges of the roads are in really bad weather - in a driving snow or rainstorm, there have been times I've been really happy to have the lights on other sides confirming where the road was, because it was not possible to see that clearly through the windshield.

Re:Doesn't help criminals

[peragrin]

I thought the old school smiley at the end of the sentence was a dead give away. But young kids nowadays have Unicode smiley's to work with.

Only children should fear the dark

[sjbe]

If no lighting makes residents stay at home because they don't feel safe outside when they'd otherwise be out and about, that seems like a problem.

Their perception of danger is of no concern to me. I'm concerned with the actuality of danger. They are adults and not children who ought to be afraid of the dark. If they don't feel safe outside then I'd suggest they spend their money improving their policing or move some place where they feel safer. Again, if they are scared of nothing (and the data indicates that they are) and decide to stay home rather than face the night then I don't see an actual problem.

Or maybe spend money and resources making residents feel safe and secure in their community?

Real security isn't going to come from a bunch of wasteful street lamps. At best it is security theater and it definitely is a huge waste of resources.

The Other White

[SuperKendall]

white lines would fix that

In snow?

It irritates me when it's hard to tell between the grey pavement and the grey road

With enough rain, there is no grey, no brown. Just water.