Alright, folks. In case you’re not in the know, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) has been replacing the bulbs of our street lights with energy-efficient LEDs since 2013 (with approximately 4,000 street lamps converted since 2014), and has since (read: today) announced further plans to enhance responsiveness in accordance with the weather.
Not that many of us would probably care, since we’ll only take notice when the lamps fail for practically any reason. But hey, since LED street lights have become more energy-efficient, it helps to reduce maintenance and manpower costs too.
According to the press release, LTA is looking to replace all street lights in the Central area with LED ones by 2019, and finish this project islandwide by 2022. Here’s hoping that this is the first step in saving taxes as well. Yeah, yeah, we know; but it’s a worthy dream, regardless.
One other helpful measure is the implementation of the Remote Control and Monitoring System (RCMS) which, as mentioned above, allows the lights to activate accordingly with weather changes. While our street lights are currently programmed to activate only with the day/night cycles, the RCMS ensures that LTA can flick its switch button in response to the needs on the ground. Maintenance will be much more efficient with its automated fault detection system as well.
The key point is that this is just the first step to the grand scheme of things in shaping Singapore to be a Smart Nation. The Government Technology Agency will be banking on LTA’s plans for smart lighting to test the possibility of integrating a shared network for low bandwidth wireless sensors, where interconnected street lights are an important factor in Singapore’s national sensor communications network.
LTA, you’ve got our vote of confidence on this — but not so much for the actual transport side of things though.
