In 2015, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti launched a Great Streets Initiative to revitalize neighborhoods by making the streets more pedestrian-friendly. New street lighting technology that can ensure better and more reliable lighting operations was an important part of the plan. To accomplish that, the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Lighting (LA BSL), needed to make its streetlight system more robust, easier to maintain and energy efficient. The LA BSL is one of five bureaus of the LA Public Works Department and is responsible for the design, construction, operation, maintenance and repair of the 220,000 lights in the City of Los Angeles.
The LA BSL sought to deploy a lighting controls system to remotely monitor and maintain their street lights – accounting for energy use and status. The LA BSL deployed a thorough process where extensive pilots were conducted to determine which lighting controls best met the city’s specific needs. The resulting retrofit solution from Signify will help LA protect its investments by making street lights smart and connected. Using the Interact City lighting management software, LA BSL can remotely control street lights, monitor their status and accurately report how much energy each light is consuming. As a result, Los Angeles revolutionized lighting maintenance as the first city in the world to control its street lighting through mobile and cloud-based technologies.
Now, the citizens of Los Angeles enjoy better visibility on well-lit streets with lighting that can be scheduled for the needs of a particular neighborhood. As the region’s first smart lighting system, the streetlights can be programmed to adapt to weather, traffic, public safety needs, maintenance and repairs. This secure system is controlled remotely, saving thousands of dollars in operational costs. Unlike first generation control systems, managing each of the street lights remotely removes the need for manual adjustments.
As a result of the plan, the Great Streets Initiative has been marked as an overwhelming success, as more than 165,000 street lights were upgraded to LED. That led to impressive savings of 63% in energy savings, while saving $8.7million USD and avoiding 47,583 tons of CO2 /year.