8,000 city street lights not working properly

Councillor Peter Fowler relayed concerns from residents to Birmingham City Council officers about day burning lamps – and was told there is a problem with certain lights.

The problem involves the electronic node which controls the lights – but it is not known where the individual lights are in the city, Councillor Fowler has said.

As a result, inspectors are having to switch on all street lights during the day – and then drive round wards to find any with a problem.

It is not clear whether the electronic problem is causing the street lights to remain on during the day or if it is a separate fault and the lights are on in the day purely as a result of the testing exercise.

In a note passed to residents, Councillor Fowler said: “The reason for the day burning lights is that the system that remotely controls the lights developed an error which led to there being approximately 8,000 “missing” Telecell IDs (the electronic node that controls an individual light).

“However, we do not yet know their geographical location on the network.

“Once the street name and locations are known, the street lighting crews can then arrange to visit the column identified and access the top of the column to obtain its specific Telecell ID.

“This column will then not come on again during the day when the next test/exercise is undertaken.”

He added the problem has been particularly noticeable in Welsh House Farm Road and Grove Lane, Harborne.

He said: “It has been frustrating for me driving around areas of Harborne and the city and seeing another one daylight burning. I report them when I see them but I can’t be all around the city.

“I do scratch my head and wonder why someone has had to manually go round and do this since November.”

A Birmingham City Council spokesperson said: “We are currently undertaking a project to improve the data held on the computer system that manages the city’s street lights.

“During the project we have needed to turn on lamps during the day as part of testing the system.

“We anticipate this project will completed by the end of March. We would like to thank Birmingham residents for their patience whilst we undertake this essential project.

“The lights need to be on so that they may be identified on the system which allows the individual columns to be recorded.”

The council has said the problem is separate to the issue recently reported in Deer’s Leap estate, Edgbaston – where lights were also on during the day.

This was due to complications in “transferring the columns to council ownership” from developer Persimmon Homes, the city council said.

David Gaussen, 68, a retired IT support worker who lives at the estate, said: “I am still puzzled about what exactly happened on my street and whether its related to the 8,000 lights.”

The city council is proposing scaling back street light usage as part of its budget proposals due to be debated on February 22.