Street Lighting

Outages

To report a street light that is out, the franchised vendor responsible for the maintenance of the light should be contacted.  For OG&E, call 272-9595.  For OEC, call 321-2024.

General Requirements

New street lighting shall be installed by a franchised vendor providing the electrical service.  For new developments, the street lighting should be shown on the preliminary plat.  Basic objectives of street lighting include aesthetics, traffic safety, security, and intersection identification and are directly related to the function of the street to be lighted.  For major thoroughfares, the primary objectives of street lighting are aesthetics and traffic safety.  For minor streets and local collectors, the primary objectives of street lighting are security and intersection identification.

Scheduling

Street lighting shall be chronologically integrated with a development.  Street lighting shall not be installed until all required offsite improvements such as water mains, sanitary sewer mains, paving, and drainage structures are completed and accepted by the City of Norman.  This will help to avoid conflicts with other Contractors and their workers.  However, street lighting shall be installed prior to extensive development to avoid interference with private landscaping.  Close coordination with the developer is required for lights to be installed without interference to private landscaping.

Location and Design

Generally, street lighting is installed as development occurs.  Spacing and sizing of thoroughfare lighting shall be in accordance with the criteria of Roadway Lighting Handbook, U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, current revision.  General guidelines exist to provide street lighting on minor streets and on local collectors as follows:

• One 4,000 lumen street light at each street or alley intersection
• One 4,000 lumen street light at each end of each cul-de-sac or other permanently dead ended street
• One 4,000 lumen street light at the approximate midpoint of curvilinear streets that prohibit visual contact between intersections
• One 4,000 lumen street light located midway between intersections that are spaced 700', or more, apart

Requests for lights within the 700' minimum may be submitted to the City Traffic Engineer for consideration along with a petition showing that 70 percent of the neighbors support the additional light.  This submission is necessary because of light levels being higher than what is outlined above.

Approvals

Requests for street lighting shall be submitted to the office of the City Traffic Engineer.  Lighting for minor streets and local collectors shall be reviewed by the City Traffic Engineer and forwarded to the franchised vendor on forms provided by the vendor.  Lighting for minor streets and collectors which are not as specified above shall require the review of the City Traffic Engineer and the Director of Public Works.  Proposals for thoroughfare lighting shall be submitted in letter form to the franchised vendor by the City Traffic Engineer, with final allowance to proceed with installation by the Director of Public Works.  The City Traffic Engineer will document, in writing, reasons for denying a request for lighting.

Technology

Light emitting diodes (LED) are an emerging technology in the area of street and roadway lighting.  LEDs differ from traditional light sources in the way they produce light.  In an incandescent lamp, a tungsten filament is heated by electric current until it glows or emits light.  In a fluorescent lamp, an electric arc excites mercury atoms, which emit ultraviolet (UV) radiation.  After striking the phosphor coating on the inside of glass tubes, the UV radiation is converted and emitted as visible light.

By contrast, an LED is a semiconductor diode.  It consists of a chip of semiconducting material treated to create a structure called a p-n (positive-negative) junction.  When connected to a power source, current flows from the p-side, or anode, to the n-side, or cathode, but not in the reverse direction.  Charge-carriers (electrons and electron holes) flow into the junction from electrodes.  When an electron meets a hole, it falls into a lower energy level, and released energy in the form of a photon, or light.  The specific wavelength or color emitted by the LED depends on the materials used to make the diode.

LED technology is considered to be a "green" technology because it uses less energy to operate and it is safer for the environment.  LED technology actually provides an increased output efficiency with a 30 to 60% reduction in energy consumption.  LED technology eliminates the mercury disposal associated with older lighting technologies which meets waste reduction legislation and is more environmentally responsible.  Another advantage of LED lighting is that it provides more consistent color and quality of light over the life of the fixture.

The City of Norman is in the process of designing a new lighting system, featuring LED technology, for the Main Street corridor from Merkle Drive to University Boulevard.  Part of the project will involve extensive research into the emerging LED roadway lighting technology to select a fixture that will meet the needs of the citizens of Norman as well as the maintenance requirements of OG&E.  It is believed that completion of this project will result in the first application of LED technology for continuous roadway lighting for a multi-lane roadway in the State of Oklahoma.