Sorry to be a party pooper, but the MetroVick is no more in the latest Streetview from this month. The column has been chopped to just above the base, leaving just a stump behind on top of the wall it was mounted on.

Just found a rare Facebook post about street lighting on a group called British Road Scene 1955-1995, with a photo of Western Road in Mitcham, South London in 1977 having its concrete columns replaced with what look either like Z9554s or GR150s on steel columns:

Sorry to burst your bubble, but the SOX lanterns on Croydon Road have now been replaced with Philips Luma Gen2s on new 8m Mallatite black post-top steel columns, which officially means that main road SOX lighting in Greater London is officially no more, sadly. On the upside, the September 2022 street view shows there is a handful of remaining SOX on Great West Road below the Chiswick Flyover in West London, just outside B&Q.

Edit: Sadly, the June 2023 street view proved me wrong as the SOX lanterns on Great West Road below the Chiswick Flyover have been replaced with Philips Luma Gen2s, but on the existing columns.

On the upside, there are a couple of Philips SGS 203s, a WRTL Airtrace, and a Philips MA90, as well as a CU Phosco P860 (a casual replacement for another MA90) mounted onto the wall.

Link: https://maps.app.goo.gl/HMgxGWDuEpbmdkgq9?g_st=ic

So I was browsing on street view around Hornchurch and I noticed these Urbis Furyo lanterns have been retrofitted with LED gear trays. I was fooled at first, thinking that they were left alone from the LED upgrade in 2016, although North Street has had its Furyos temporarily replaced with Thorn R2L2s as placeholders until they retrofitted the former. I’m glad Havering Council made an effort to retain its original decorative street lighting, if it was another council, they probably would’ve permanently swapped the lanterns!

Unfortunately, it looks like Greenwich is completely LED now, save for a few roads where mass replacements seemingly haven’t commenced as of yet and certain housing estates and footpaths are still HPS lit. Such a shame as Greenwich had the largest stock of HPS streetlights in the whole of London, and as Ali ZX2 says, the borough had a far larger variety of HPS lanterns and columns/brackets dating from the 1950s. At least Waltham Forest managed to retain its original (formerly) SON lanterns, such as the Urbis ZX series and the WRTL 2600s, as well as a smattering of Vectras and some Philips SGS 203s, despite all these being converted to CMH long ago, as well as having newer generation HID lanterns such as the Urbis Sapphire, Evolo, Paseo, etc. The stock of concrete columns seem to be decreasing sadly, but a few hidden survivors can be spotted here and there if you know where to look.



Sadly, at the time you’ve written this comment, Greenwich has already wiped out a majority of their old street lighting stock. Works have started since July 2021, but it was only early and mid 2022 that saw a dramatic increase in LED lanterns. Speaking of which, they are using Urbis Axia 3s, just like Bromley did, and they are even copying what Bromley did by cutting the brackets back on columns, although there are some instances where the brackets are kept the same. Personally, I’m not a big fan of cut back brackets, as it ruins the characteristic of the original columns, but given the LEDs improved optical performance, it does seem like a necessity, unfortunately. What really annoys me though is when the brackets are completely removed and those chunky looking spigot reducers are plonked atop the columns, it makes the whole installation look ugly! It also seems like South East London are using the same LED lanterns, such as the Axia range, and are chopping brackets back on their columns too. What happened to London boroughs having unique street lighting? As Ali ZX2 mentions, most London boroughs are using black columns which are mostly post-top, and personally I really love black columns due to their smart appearance, however it seems like most London boroughs are copying each other now.

It it also worth noting that not only Havering, Kingston, Sutton, Bromley, Barnet and Bexley have retained their unique colour schemes, but it’s also Wandsworth (beige), Richmond upon Thames (dark green), Merton (olive brown), Hillingdon (multi-colour combination of white and sky blue), Waltham Forest (light grey, black, white, and dark green) and Redbridge (white, grey and silver). There are also still plenty of London boroughs that still use brackets on replacements, such as Havering, Redbridge, Waltham Forest, Hackney, Barnet, Brent, Hillingdon, etc, so there are still a lot of street lighting installations in London that aren’t post-top. Lastly, I believe Southwark is another London borough that isn’t yet predominantly LED, as there are still plenty of Urbis ZX12s (running CosmoPolis lamps) on side streets, as well as a some ZX1s, ZX2s, Evolos, and a handful of WRTL SRL 8s, Philips SGS 203s, etc, at least for the time being.

There are still some SOX Phillips MA left on A316 Chertsey road still there as of 2 July 2023. https://maps.app.goo.gl/rGne3JgwU8ZeSGBL8?g_st=ic

Also another thing I forgot to mention the Philips MA60 is that they are the early pre 1981 (I believe) type with the grey spigot . The were replaced in about 2014-15  with CU Phosco P850s and for some reason a couple were missed out. In early 2022 the Thorn Rivera and Philips SGS203 at Hospital Bridge Roundabout as well as the Indal Aitrace and Indal Arcs over the footbridge were replaced by Philips Luma Gen2 and some of the P850s were casually replaced by CU Phosco P862s. Nice to see them survive nearly 9 years after they were supposed to be replaced  

A recent trip to Brighton and Hove shows that a lot more LED has appeared, this time in the form of the Phosco E950. During my trip, the only discharge lighting I saw were Urbis Evolos, which themselves are becoming less frequent in Brighton and Hove. Not sure about the rest of East Sussex however, but I can safely say that Brighton and Hove are now mostly LED, with very few discharge lighting remaining.

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No LED is better than other light sources (apart from probably lanterns such as Philips LumiStreets)!

Link: https://maps.app.goo.gl/b5Ez2Vny63MUn3NE9?g_st=ic

While I was browsing some streetlights around the London Borough of Newham (the borough I’m based in), it came to my surprise that some Urbis Axia 1s were being trialled on Bridge Road in East Ham, according to the June 2014 street view. Now it’s extremely rare for Newham council to install Urbis Axia 1s as the only place I’ve seen them installed en masse is on the Channelsea Path in Stratford. Unfortunately, even the Axia 1s themselves were replaced with another set of LED lanterns, presumably DW Windsor Kiriums (one of the borough’s staple LED lanterns) in around 2018 despite the previous lanterns already being LEDs that were installed circa 2013, though I saw one being reused on Ratcliff Road in Forest Gate as a casual replacement just recently.

Edit 26/07/23: So it turns out I jinxed my statement about a casual replacement Urbis Axia 1 being reused on Ratcliff Road, as we drove past a couple days ago and I saw it was replaced with an Axia 3.1 shortly after it was installed. I’m unsure why it was replaced, as it was working perfectly fine when we last drove past at night. I have seen another Axia 3.1 casually replace a failed R2L2 at the end of Maud Road in Plaistow.

And to add to my last comment, most of the heritage street lighting such as the DW Windsor Iffleys in Peckham and the Strand Bs in Kingswood Estate haven’t been converted to LED, as well as the decorative Urbis lanterns (Paseos, I think) on Rye Lane in Peckham. While there are more LED streetlights on main roads than on side roads, there are still a decent amount of non-LED installations on main roads that can be found within the borough. For example, the east leg of Peckham Rye contains a mixture of Urbis ZX1s, ZXU1s, ZX3 zebras, and ZX12s as well as a handful of MRL 6 and SRL 8 lanterns, most on a mixture of Fabrikat and S&L columns. I’m unsure if they still remain as of 2023, but I do hope so.