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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 5:27 pm 
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Stelmer wrote:
Oooooohhhhhh i've found something interesting.


Orange sodium catenary lighting illuminates the M62 passing through the M61 interchange. I really love this image.
http://www.cbrd.co.uk/media/photo/15/18.jpg


I remember those well! The lanterns were Philips MU62s (IIRC) and they used to fascinate me as a child. When my parents and I used to travel to Nottingham to see family via the M62 and M1 I used to always love seeing these as it meant we were well on our way and leaving the North West! (Not that there's anything wrong with the North West you understand  ;) ) I think they were taken down in the mid-90s and replaced by ZX3s (boring!). The other lanterns on columns (S&L by the look of them) were Philips SDP254s, they were the favoured motorway lanterns before the MA60 came along. They looked very similar to the MU62 lanterns.

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M62 passing the farmhouse in the middle, note the road is unlit.
http://www.cbrd.co.uk/media/photo/15/11.jpg


I remember this being unlit as well, I think it became lit in the late 80s or early 90s as I remember my dad mentioning there was now lighting over the Pennines on the M62 where there hadn't been previously on one of our Nottingham excursions.

David wrote:
When I was at Uni (in the 1990s) I read a book about lighting design (well, the street lighting bits because that's what interested me!), and the subject of terminating lighting, and how to do it well, was discussed in great detail. They believed the best solution for twin or opposite lighting arrangement (i.e. double brackets along the central reservation, or pairs of columns placed opposite each other on each verge), was to deliberately illuminate a specific light-to-dark 'transition area' using just the light spilling over from the other carriageway. This would be achieved by ending the lighting on your side of the road before the lighting on the other side was ended. The overspill light from the other side would be enough to provide a lower level of illumination for the few seconds you need for your eyes to adjust to the dark.

As far as I understand, there are no such issues going from an unlit section to a lit section of road, so there is no need for a dark-to-light transition area when entering a lit section of road.

On an opposite arrangement, the columns on your side of the road would end sooner than the other side, and on a twin arrangement, the last few columns would have single brackets pointing to the other side. There would be no need to adjust the column spacings, and no need different wattage lamps.

Despite it being such a simple and, dare I say it, obvious solution, I don't ever recall seeing it in real life, either before I read that book, or since. :-(


That's very interesting and a sensible approach to take and no, I've never seen it executed anywhere either! They would rather plunge us from blinding orange SON light into total darkness without any warning or transition period!  :roll:


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 7:59 pm 
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From the archives (and Ukastle 2), the story of the lighting of the lighting on the Lancashire- Yorkshire border section of the M62 is outlined below:

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In the late 1960s, when the western part of the trans-Pennine section of the M62 was designed by the Lancashire Sub-Unit of the North Western Road Construction Unit, it was realised that adverse weather conditions would be encountered much more frequently than on most of the rest of the motorway system. Because of hill fogs, road lighting would be required with an over-ride system to enable the police with radar guns to switch the lights on when necessary. Snow and ice would be normal features of any winter and so would ice forming on the lighting columns causing extra loading on them. The lighting column design also had to allow for strong winds common in this part of the world. Site-specific column designs were prepared accordingly.

The steel columns were manufactured in France by PetitJean. It was customary in France for steel lighting columns to be galvanised and Petitjean naturally assumed that this batch should be galvanised. They were surprised when told by the MoT that this should not be done; the reason cited for this instruction was that galvanising was not an approved treatment in the then current MoT specification. For various valid reasons, it had been decided that the columns should be located in concrete sockets cast in-situ and, unfortunately, this accentuated the adverse conditions to which the columns would be subjected. The winter conditions in the area invariably required the use of considerable quantities of salt to keep the road in a safe condition and, of course, corrosion of any unprotected steel was accelerated.

The columns were not unprotected. They had to be painted to a reasonably high-standard specification which would, in a more normal location, have been adequate but, in the prevailing environment, proved deficient. This particularly showed itself in the column sockets where acid accumulated, causing corrosion and requiring the replacement of the columns well before the end of their normal anticipated life.

Galvanising of steel lighting columns, with or without subsequent painting, is now, of course, so normal to be unremarkable. Painting galvanised columns is advisable in any case as the galvanising is slightly porous. The columns which replaced the original ones on this stretch of the M62 had welded flange plates to the foot which then bolted to pre-cast concrete plinths. This considerably reduced the problems of corrosion, but the fatigue element was accentuated and produced a change in the specification of the replacements. So they have, in turn, been replaced by twin bracket arm columns in the central reservation, with the now standard higher mounting height. The original column sites may also be seen; in this case, at the rear of the hardshoulder on the edge of the concrete gulley originally installed to retain rock falls and to prevent carriageway obstruction.


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 11:23 pm 
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Thanks for that info Phosco152  :)

Getting the lighting columns right on the M62 must have cost a lot of money! I'm sure there used to be large sections of unlit carriageway on the M62 though, at one time.  :?


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 11:56 pm 
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How long now until the Pontefract to Goole section gets lighting.

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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sat Dec 05, 2009 11:43 pm 
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Urbis Saturn Land wrote:
How long now until the Pontefract to Goole section gets lighting.


Is that the only bit of M62 not lit now?


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 12:11 am 
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The junction at Ferrybridge has lighting (dual optic ZX4's), but otherwise I believe it's unlit. I know around Goole it is, as I've stopped off at a McDonalds services just outside goole on my bike and the M62 looked wierd as there was no lighting...

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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 12:16 am 
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Mazeteam wrote:
The junction at Ferrybridge has lighting (dual optic ZX4's), but otherwise I believe it's unlit. I know around Goole it is, as I've stopped off at a McDonalds services just outside Goole on my bike and the M62 looked wierd as there was no lighting...


I believe the lighting runs out just after junction 33 then your plunged into darkness as I've too cycled over the junction at 36 near to the services and wondered where is the lighting until i remembered where it runs out.

I'm guessing the section between 33 and 38 would probably be done within the next decade known with the HA.

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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 12:48 am 
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From the M6, the M62 is unlit till it turns into the M60. It is then lit all the way to just before junction 30.

Lighting returns at J32 then ends at Ferrybridge Services/old A1 exit. From there to the A63, it's in darkness and is quite peaceful and pleasant to drive on at 9pm as it's very quiet.

On a different note, the new lanterns at J29 and J28-25 appear to be Sapphires as they remind me of Armadillos  :lol:

The replacements at J38 of the A1 are also Sapphires. Probably 600w and the spacings are quite close, compared to the old MA60's. Column heights are the same as the MA60's.

The difference between SON and SOX is really obvious and striking. The SON is more ''in your face bright and the SOX is more ''general illumination'' or, mood light as I call it :lol:


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 3:44 pm 
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Yeah, SON isn't really suitable or necessary on motorways imo. SOX is the best form of lighting as being a linear light source there's no bright spot, the light is consistent. With SON you get bright spots, then dark bits, then bright, then dark etc etc. Ok, you get this effect with SOX to some extent but it's not as pronounced. Colour rendering isn't necessary on a motorway and to be honest 600w lighting is certainly never necessary! 180w SOX is fine, it lights the motorway well when installed correctly. It doesn't require these tight spacings the modern SON lanterns have or the increased mounting heights. SON was good for town centres in the 1980s and 90s before MH technology was developed but I'm afraid it's uses are obsolete now.


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 Post subject: Re: Motorway Lighting
PostPosted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 10:19 pm 
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More news on the A1:

The SOX tunnel lights are being replaced now under the A638 at J38. Anyone know how i'd go about saving a few? I'd like one....


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