Let there be lights... year 'round.
I noticed the other day that having lights (the ones wrapped around the street lights) on Elmwood and Hertel really add a lot to the ambiance to the streets. I realize these are "holiday" lights, but why not leave them up during our long, dark winter months? I really think the lights on the streets make the areas seem more interesting and inspire people to stay out later shopping and going out to eat. Please leave the lights up longer, the neighborhoods seem so much more inviting. Thanks! -Andrea
Indeed Elmwood and Hertel have looked especially vibrant this past holiday season, as have other districts including Main Street and Chippewa. Obviously these business districts would not leave the evergreens and ornaments out too long past the holiday season, but Andrea is write that they do add an inviting look to the streets.
In order to answer Andrea's question I called Sue Whelan, owner of Floral Explorations on Hertel Avenue. Sue is a boardmember of the Hertel - North Buffalo Business Association, an association that has been around for approximately 30 years. Sue was excited to say that there are upwards of 75 businesses active these days, and they are now accepting membership from the neighborhood residents.
"There is a big campaign coming up - we are expecting a major increase in membership next year," she told me. "Since the money from membership goes towards things like holiday decorations, our plan for 2007 is to buy all new decorations and really show off the avenue. Some money also comes from the Italian Festival. This year the snowflake light were the same as last year, but there is a big push for bigger and better next year. People are so encouraged, and there are new businesses opening up everywhere. Kabling, Home Accents, Oddball and Empire have opened on our block alone. At one time we had banners on the light standards, but due to wear and tear they are no longer around. We are talking about adding decorations throughout the year, and I encourage anyone that is interested in seeing these types of advances on Hertel to get involved with the association."
The normal meetings are the second Tuesday of the month, and they are planning a big party towards the end of January. If you want to get involved, please call Sue at Floral Explorations: 716-838-4916
The holiday lights are especially effective because they are easy on the eyes and provide an intimate form of soft lighting.
On the other hand, the illumination from most of our city street lights is blinding and garish.
Not many people would choose to install a no-cutoff, 400 watt, high-pressure sodium bulb in their yard....so then why do we accept them in our public spaces?
We are nicknamed the City of Light. Lighting technologies have advanced considerably over the last decade, yet our city is still stuck in its old and tired ways.
We should demand better from our city engineers and National Grid.
Oh god... please don't leave them up year round. All I can think of is the neighbor I had growing up in "looney acres" who left their christmas lights and santa on the porch roof all year.
Sorry for the length here - the answers for good, efficient lighting are not simple, inexpensive, or even invented yet!
"Holiday Lights" are typically inefficient incandescent lamps that have a short life span. There are some available in LED lamps that are "rated" for 100,000 hours - however the light is blue-white rather than the nice warm white of incandescent lamps and they are very expensive.
Manufacturers are working towards better LED lamps - the market is enormous.
Good street lighting is much more expensive than the street lighting costs Buffalo presently incurs. Some cities have good street lighting in some districts. Parts of Ann Arbor, MI for instance.
Merchants and pedestrians alike want better lighting but most do not know what it is they would want. My suggestions:
Encourage store owners to have non-tinted windows (Buffalo building codes insist on untinted or lightly tinted windows – but it is routinely ignored) at ground level with efficient show window lighting left on in the evening. The non-tinted windows allows the light to be seen, and allows the inside of the store to be seen from the outside. Walking along a sidewalk at night, seeing the lights on in windows, and that light spilling onto the sidewalk and pedestrians, simply feels good and feels safe. These show window lights create the impression that people are around, and this sidewalk is safe. Observe this and you will understand immediately.
Forget about luminaries at 25 feet and higher. These lamp poles are for highways. They are designed to illuminate the road. People in cars are already safe, cars come with lights anyway; how about lights for pedestrians instead. The light rays from fixtures mounted on tall poles rudely spill into second floor windows where we want to encourage people to live. “Light trespass” is outlawed in the City of Buffalo building code because it is annoying – of course the City is immune from its codes!
We want lights for pedestrians, but not lights that blind. Light poles approximately 10 to 12 feet high, spaced 25 to 35 feet apart, with lamps bright enough to provide useful, safe light; but not so bright that the glare is uncomfortable and unsafe.
The City typically installs light poles spaced 75 to 100 feet apart with brighter lights because many engineers say that is what is needed. And it is cheaper. But it’s not cheaper if people don’t want to be around. It’s not cheaper if the people leave and the tax base evaporates.
Though honestly, many wealthy, successful areas have lousy lighting. So can attractive lighting help? I think so. I think to improve an area, good lighting along with other improvements, will help. Decades of planning errors won’t be solved over (an attractively illuminated) night. But better lighting will help and will create an impression that someone cares to make something better.
Ann Arbor, Michigan has lighting such as I describe here. It looks great. The light poles around the Niagara Mohawk building are spaced more closely than anywhere else in Buffalo – how did that happen? Two blocks west on Huron Street there is not a single light pole between Main and Pearl!
Good quality luminaires. Buffalo has dozens of different styles of street lighting fixtures. Not all the luminaires that look good have good photometrics. The very nice (but I think inappropriate looking) luminaires on Chippewa Street have terrible light distribution patterns. Walk past them and observe. Sharp beams of light in several places around the light fixture, very uneven.
The best lamp type is debatable. The City of Buffalo has mostly used high-pressure sodium lamps (light amber colored light) for the last twenty years. Some luminaires have mercury-vapor lamps (white with a slight a greenish tint). Now more luminaires have been fitted with metal-halide lamps (bluish-white colored light). The metal-halide lamps show colors more accurately but the light is too harsh. Don’t stare at them – lots of UV light in their spectrum. The high-pressure sodium lamps are easier on the eyes but colors are not very accurate. The old incandescent lamps are the nicest, but inefficient and expensive to maintain; thus reserved only for the rich and famous folks on Tudor Place and St. Catherine’s Court. Now some of those lamps have been replaced and are horribly bright on the nice short poles there.
Someday a better lamp will be invented. Until then, I tell people to walk around, observe, know what you are looking at, and decide which lamp is the best compromise. Again, don’t listen to engineers, they only look at numbers, cost, and efficiency. Don’t think about which lamp is cheapest. “Cheapest” isn’t always the best value.
My suggestions are more expensive than other possibilities. I am frustrated by the poor quality lighting Buffalo and other communities accept. The science of good lighting and the effects of various lighting designs on human perception are not fully understood. Lighting is part art, part science.
Daniel Sack - lighting consultant - Pataphysics
I miss the old street lights that were on most of the West Side & North Buffalo, before Griffin's thugs ripped them out. (Remember his sneering reaction to complaints that the new ones were too high to light the sidewalks? : "THEN WE'LL CUT DOWN THE TREES!" )
We should have those old standards, with a couple of bright compact flourescents in each, instead of the blinding "Thruway lights" we have now.
You just need to look up the road to Lewiston for a great example of lighting a busting city street (Center) to make it seem cozy and welcoming. It's gorgeous now and even when it's not Christmas.
As for Hertel and window tints, the north side of the street gets a TON of sunlight and many store owners need to use blinds/tints to stop the sunlight from ruining their product and their floors/business interiors from fading. It is a smart business decision to protect your merchandise and assets.
A solution could be mounted on either side of each business, using sconces to draw attention. I'm not an electrician and couldn't even guess as to how they would be wired or cost - but it would be a quaint, unique way to have a uniform lit up look without destroying the overall look of Hertel. I think spotlighting to hightlight business signs could also work, as long as it was subtle and not that annoying white light glare on the business name.
Either which way, the excitement on Hertel with the new businesses (Accentric, Kabling, Oddball, Kabob House, etc...) are injecting new life and new revenue into an area that could rival Elmwood soon in amenities. It's great to see people taking a chance on a great street.
Dan, thanks for the narrative. One of my frustrations is that the city doesn't demand better from their supplier, National Grid.
The city orders their lamps from a very limited and antiquated selection. The brochure that I've seen was from Niagara Mohawk and seem to be 20 years old.
There are lamps produced today that have much better photometrics and come in a variety of full or half cutoff styles, yet the city just accepts what has been presented to them.
I totally agree that more low intensity luminaires spaced closer together are preferable to the high intensity lamps spaced far apart.
I haven't been to Ann Arbor, but my favorite city for lighting is Amsterdam.
In some sense of irony, they neglected to put holiday lights up on Jefferson Avenue this season, at a time when the area is seeing a much-needed turnaround.