Prestigious Presentation on LUAS Lighting

At the spring seminar of the Institution of Lighting Engineers (ILE), Michael Perse, Public Lighting Engineering Manager, ESB Contracts, made the keynote technical presentation. The presentation centred on ESB Contracts design and installation role for the lighting on the recently opened Green and Red lines of the LUAS.

The part of the project ESB Contracts was responsible for was the technically challenging existing tram route. The overriding criteria was for the design to be integrated seamlessly with the cityscape. In shared space areas, the challenge was to provide lighting for a mix of tram, vehicle and pedestrian traffic. While a conventional approach to the lighting was acceptable on the city outskirts, the challenge for Michael was to design a visually and aesthetically pleasing addition to the streetscape.

Many of the city centre streets contained street furniture such as old cast iron lighting columns of architectural and artistic interest, which were mentioned in an early Environmental Impact Statement. To reduce the impact of LUAS and to help retain the character of these streets, it was decided to retain these columns and integrate them as far as possible in the lighting scheme. Another restriction in the city centre was solved by wallmounted lanterns that had to be specially designed to prevent light trespassing through windows on buildings with sensitive residents.

ESB Contracts was the successful tenderer and was awarded the contract by Dublin City Council in 2001. The tender competition contained the leading Public Lighting players. The facts and figures speak for themselves: 8km of track lighting using 362 lanterns. 61 of these were the oldstyle heritage fittings from lighting manufacturer Urbis Lighting, along with trampole-mounted and wall-mounted types. Urbis Lighting, a UK company, supplied all the lanterns to ESB Contracts on this project.

ESB Contracts' role included design, detailed engineering, project management, as well as procurement and most importantly, installation. The ILE Lighting Seminar is held biannually and attended by Local Authority engineers, lighting specialists and consultants, as well as leading manufacturers. It was a great honour for Michael, a former Chairman of the Irish region of the ILE, to be invited to make his presentation.