New street lights

The borough's first new street lights are installed on Bonscale Crescent in September 2011. Councillor Jacqueline Beswick, Cabinet Member for Partnerships met with Eon PFI Manager Greg Watson as the first column is installed.

As part of the project to replace and upgrade old street lighting across Rochdale borough, the 5,000th new lighting column has been erected, representing around 20% of the total that will be in place around the borough before the work finishes.

Areas to benefit so far are Langley, Hopwood Hall, Smallbridge and Firgrove, Milkstone and Deeplish. Installations are currently underway in Balderstone and Kirkholt and will continue in early 2013, before moving on to Spotland, Falinge and Bamford.

Over 1,000 residents living in areas where the work has been completed were surveyed last month, with 78% saying the work was ‘excellent’ or ‘good’. 76% rated the overall effectiveness of their new lighting as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ and 78% said it was ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ compared to the old street lighting. 53% said they thought it would reduce the likelihood of crime, and 70% thought it would improve road safety. The level of care and consideration by E.ON contractors on site was also rated as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ by 71% of respondents. 

This joint Private Finance Initiative (PFI) project between Rochdale Council, Oldham Council, the Community Lighting Partnership and energy company E.ON is seeing thousands of street lights, signs, beacons, bollards and sub way lighting replaced. 

The programme is being co-ordinated from the councils’ and energy company E.ON’s base on the Kingsway Business Park in Rochdale.

The new columns don’t look much different to the ones, but it’s the technology being used that makes the difference. They’ll save money as well as carbon with innovations such as high tech remote monitoring which allows the lights to be dimmed at off-peak periods. The system will also monitor the energy consumption of the lights, highlighting any potential problems so they can be attended to.

It will lead to a safer and lighter environment, utilising the latest in energy efficient equipment, said Greg Watson, Head of Highways Lighting (North) from E.ON, a partner of the Community Lighting Partnership which is undertaking the work: “We know the benefits that new, lower energy street lights bring to communities in terms of running costs and carbon emissions, but it’s especially good to see that local residents are pleased with how the installation process is going and are beginning to see the benefits in terms of their feelings of safety and security.”

“We’ve already seen examples around the country of local authorities turning off non essential street lights in a bid to save money. But we believe that the investment that Rochdale and Oldham councils are making here is a blueprint for local authorities across the country to cut energy use and associated costs whilst keeping the lights on and the streets safe for residents.”