[Above] Councillor Lauren Townsend, Cabinet Member for Public Realm checking in on an LED and CMS node installation outside properties in Monkston.
Milton Keynes City Council is installing a new city-wide control system to all its 58,000 streetlights to help pinpoint faults more quickly. The system will also allow the city council to plan streetlight repairs and maintenance more effectively.
Each streetlight will be fitted with a node that sends and receives information through an ultra-narrow band (UNB) low energy radio signal, including letting the council’s highways team know when a light has gone out. The nodes do not capture traffic or personal data.
Installation will start this summer and should be complete by spring next year.
The system, called CMS or Central Management System, can also allow lighting levels to be turned up or down from one central control centre, which for instance means the city council could increase the lighting level where there has been a road traffic collision or decrease the light in an area where there is little or no traffic at certain times of the night.
The latest tech upgrade comes as the city council is replacing old streetlights with lower LED versions, that last longer, need less maintenance, and will save millions of kilowatt hours of energy each year – as much as might be used in 1,700 homes. *
“We’re always looking at how we can use new technology to make improvements and this new system will be game changer for us in how we plan and carry out streetlight repairs. It also means that we will know exactly where any faulty lights are so residents no longer need to report them to us.
This is yet another way we’re investing in modern technology to reduce our costs and energy use, which all adds up to our becoming carbon neutral by 2030.”
The approximate timing for the LED and CMS fitting programmes by area can be found on the city council’s website in the streetlighting section.
*Based on Ofgem average household electricity usage of 2,900 kWh of electricity per year.