Bath Lighting Guidance To Be Created

Guidelines on what any replacement street lights should look like and the levels of light produced by them in the City of Bath Conversation Area are to be drawn-up by the Council.

Although the Council already installs heritage columns and lanterns in some streets in order to uphold the qualities of the World Heritage Site, there is no guidance available to communities about what type of lighting they can expect in their street.

Councillor Roger Symonds (Lib-Dem, Combe Down), Cabinet Member for Transport, said, “The Council receives regular feedback from residents living in the World Heritage Site about the design of street lighting and type of light being emitted. We want to make our approach to street lighting more consistent so that communities know to expect when a replacement takes place.

“Guidance will be developing over the coming months and consultation will take place with local residents associations and heritage groups.”

The announcement means that there will be a pause to the Council’s roll-out in the City of Bath Conservation Area of a district-wide project to reduce energy costs to the local taxpayer by replacing conventional street lights with state of the art LED technology.

Councillor Symonds added, “We are making excellent progress on the progress of the LED lighting project that, when complete, will save the local taxpayer a substantial amount of money. The pause in the Conservation Area will allow the Council to consider a roll-out of softer light and lanterns which are more appropriate to the World Heritage Site.”

Around £200,000 per year will be saved and the Council’s carbon emissions will reduce by nearly 800 tonnes per year – equivalent to 3% of the Council’s total carbon footprint.

The vast majority of traffic route lanterns have already been replaced out of 4,000 following a successful trial at Hicks Gate, one of the first routes in the UK lit with this new technology. There are a total of 16,000 streetlights in the area.