Wanderlust World Wanderlust World Electric street lights first came into use in the late 1870s. The early lamps used a carbon arc to provide illumination for pedestrians and drivers in urban areas. Since that day, lighting technology has changed to incandescent and then fluorescent lighting. Today, the most common source of roadway lighting is high pressure sodium and metal halide.
Lighting standard are not only applied to highways and urban streets, but also to many public areas such as university campuses, hospitals, municipal offices, bus stops, subway entrances and pedestrian avenues. For a state highway or city avenue, a lighting standard can specify height of the lighting pole, distance from pole to pole, quantitative measurement of light on sidewalk or road surface (usually measured in footcandles), type of light used and hours of operation.
Illumination specifications and requirements are dependent on a general description of the road area. For instance, the Minnesota Department of Transportation breaks down lighting conditions for roads and highway into the following categories: They are continuous freeway lighting, partial interchange lighting, complete interchange lighting, underpass lighting, lighting for other streets and highways and lighting on bridges.