Another reason you're seeing such a dramatic increase in perceived illumination is because of where the new LED street lights place their light...on the ground, sidewalk and roadway which is where the objects would be that we'd need and want to see.
Old round or tubular shaped HID lighting (mercury vapor, metal halide, low and high pressure sodium) had a reflector behind them and a refractor / lens to help diffuse and direct the light in the intended direction, which is mostly down and toward the ground. But optics not always being perfect, a lot of that light went into the surrounding area and also upward, where it did little good. Some went into our eyes as glare, closing the pupils and lowering our ability to see objects that we can see only by reflected light.
As the signal & lighting maint. supervisor of a city in N. CA., I was never a proponent of the old-fashioned, "nostalgic" post lights installed downtown in the revived shopping area because they only lit the storefronts (great), some of the sidewalk (not very good) and cast glare directly into the drivers' eyes (NOT so good). Furthermore, the cast aluminum pole shafts were delicate and their unit cost was high (twice as much as a "standard" street light).
By design, the new LED's require very little, if any, optics to place their warmer, whiter light where it's needed and desired. Their higher lumen output, lower energy cost and longer life is icing on the cake.
I am so glad I'm not the only person who finds the "rustic-looking" street lights to be ridiculous, nay, asinine!
Here is what my city has elected to go with in many locations where they presumably want to achieve a "folksy" or "olde fashioned" look to the area:
I need to have my cataracts fixed, but have been waiting for the state of the art in flexible lenses to improve because I really really miss having my eyes be able to perform "autofocus".
And I had both eyes experience
posterior vitreous detachment a few years back. The result of both this and the cataracts is that I'm easily annoyed by and somewhat blinded by light shining directly into my eyes.
So all of that probably makes me more aware of certain lighting issues, but those ridiculous decorative street lights that emit most of their light NOT onto the road surface are one of my pet peeves. They blind drivers, waste energy, and pollute the night sky. Many places have passed laws banning lighting that ruins the dark-sky with excessive upward-directed light. The lights my city has selected are the very opposite of what one wants. The vast majority of the light they emit is either blinding drivers or just shooting upwards, wasted, and wrecking night viewing of stars, meteors, etc.
Generally, this area is fantastic for night-sky watching because of the low population. So it's fairly easy to get away from town and find true "dark-sky" areas where you can look up and see or photograph the milky way with ease, as well as other faint objects such as meteors, satellites, etc.
I wish the city council would get their heads out, and see how stupid these lights are. Besides, nobody designed lights this badly even long ago. Back when the light came from gas or even gas-mantel type lights, the light was precious, and not to be wasted this way. So most truly old-fashioned lighting at least attempted to direct the light to the surfaces where you wanted-needed it. These decorative lights are just plain stupid!
@Mr_D ,
FWIW, I lived up north of you in Santa Clara County for 29 years. Years before my arrival in '74, the City of San Jose required that all street lighting that was in the public right-of-way, City-maintained or any large number in a small area be low pressure sodium. Unlike the high pressure sodium (pinkish), mercury vapor (bluish) or metal halide (less bluish), the low pressure sodium was very orange-like but it was monochromatic (one color), not a blend of many colors (polychromatic). This property allowed the astronomers at Lick Observatory on Mt. Hamilton to use just a filter or two to block out the ambient light from those street lights and improve their visibility of the night sky.
Of course, no one else liked it, especially the cops. It was almost impossible to correctly identify color of clothing, hair, or vehicles. Coolant or other liquids on the pavement looked like blood. Everyone looked yellow with brown lips.
All of the early LPS lamps were Norelco (Phillips) brand and were made in Holland. Later, they were made by more companies.
Eventually, the car lots got a waiver so they could properly show the color of the cars for sale. They used mostly metal halide, the best HID lamp for color rendition at the time. In '94 I retrofitted several hundred traffic signals with LEDs (red, yellow and green LED modules vs. old tungsten incandescent lamps behind red, yellow or green glass lenses). The power for one 12" signal indication went from 150 watts to 25 watts....quite a savings in energy.
When you see one of the old glass lenses for the green up close you'll marvel how blue they were...that was to color-correct the yellowish glow of incandescent so it would appear green!
When I left there in '04 there after 31 years in the field there were no viable LED street lights on the market....I'm glad to see they have arrived. I'm a BIG fan of LEDs.
One thing that is interesting is the human eye's ability to discern contrast between lighter and darker areas. And that's about the best in the amber range of color. So the low pressure sodium lights may make driving safer, especially in adverse conditions, by improving our ability to see somewhat.
Skiers almost always wear amber goggles or sunglasses because it enhances the ability to see the subtle variations presented by snow that is illuminated by dull, diffuse light from a cloudy sky. And it helps "cut through" snow, rain, fog, etc. That is why true fog lights are always amber as well.
But recently, people have begun using headlight bulbs that emit light more in the bluish range (higher color temperatures). This is bad for a number of reasons. First, of course, is that the yellowish light that "old school" headlight lamps emit is far better for letting us see contrast. Next, bluish light is more readily diffused by mist, rain, snow, etc., so it tends to be directed back towards the driver far worse in those conditions. And third, it tends to dazzle oncoming drivers worse.
Add to that the fact that people are buying aftermarket LED replacement "bulbs" for their headlights. These are almost never DOT approved.
The problem is that while a typical halogen lamp for a headlight emits all of its light from a tiny filament (perhaps 1/8" long by 1/32" diameter), which is carefully positioned to be at the focal point or design point of the headlight, the LED replacement lamps have many emitters, typically arranged around a cylinder that can be several inches long and 1/2" in diameter! Obviously this defeats the careful design of the headlight reflector, and a HUGE amount of the emitted light goes out in all directions rather than being concentrated onto the road in a safe pattern. So these aftermarket LED lamps end up blinding oncoming drivers very badly, and not doing what the driver wants anyhow.
Yes, they may be very bright. But 90% of the light they emit is blinding oncoming drivers and spraying out where it doesn't illuminate the areas the driver needs to see.
I've considered building a gadget with an easily deployable array of photodetectors that officials could easily install on a wall somewhere, and then use to objectively analyze the light pattern and aim from a persoon's headlights. As much as I'm not generally a fan of government regulations and interference, I think vehicles suspected of using non-approved headlights, auxiliary lights, etc., should be pulled over and directed to submit to a headlight aim/pattern test.
If the lighting is not acceptable, then the driver should be fined as well as forced to replace the faulty lighting.
I'm sick of being blinded by idiots with aftermarket headlamps, driving lights, etc., who also seem to have no clue that you should dim your headlights for oncoming cars.
There, I've had my rant. I feel ever so much better now!
