Home - Projects - Urban lighting strategy

Urban lighting strategy

$200,000
The way lighting is used in Wanganui's city streets and recreational areas needs reviewing.

Current lighting was installed without much thought for the environment and we are polluting the atmosphere with too much light. Queens Park at night, for example, can be a blinding experience.

Better lighting will make our streets safer by reducing glare and blind spots, and more attractive by highlighting our beautiful heritage buildings and trees.

Currently some CCTV cameras are blinded by streetlights and improving lighting will aid crime prevention.

Ritchie Minnell, Town Centre Operations Manager for Mainstreet:

"Mainstreet totally supports the urban lighting strategy. Currently, streetlights are lost in the trees and the coloured lights used distort
people and objects below. Our under-verandah lighting is over emphasized and doesn't provide any ambience to our streets.

"New lighting will reflect downwards not upwards so the sky won't be filled with brightness, and will be cheaper. We plan to use better lighting for our heritage buildings. Three new lights have recently been put up outside the National Bank in Majestic Square - this is an example of how we would like to see lighting throughout the Wanganui CBD."

 

Colin Irvine, Senior Sergeant, Wanganui Police:

“Redesigning Wanganui’s inner city lighting arrangements will have two benefits. Firstly, places that have high usage by residents at night will be lit in such a way as to create a safe environment. Secondly, the aesthetic effect of proper lighting will make the community’s heritage buildings much more attractive at night.

“Better lighting will result in a reduction in crime in our community – this has been proven by similar lighting strategies being used in other areas of New Zealand, and is why the Police have inputted into the proposed strategy.”

Wanganui District Council Web site