TRANSPORT AUTHORITIES HAVE significantly reduced the amount of public lighting on two stretches of primary road and at a number of motorway junctions this year, including over 10 interchanges on the main Dublin-Galway road.

Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) said the public lighting was removed to help achieve Ireland’s target of a 33% reduction in public sector energy usage, towards the 20% national target set out in the EU’s 2012 Energy Efficiency Directive.

The most recent locations where lights have been removed included the N25 Waterford bypass, excluding the toll plaza and junctions W1 and W2; the N40/N22 Ballincollig bypass, including some junctions; and nine of the 11 junctions on the M1 between Gormanston, Co Meath and Dundalk, Co Louth.

Sinn Féin TD for Louth Ruairí Ó Murchú wrote last month to Jack Chambers, the junior minister responsible for road safety, to pass on concerns raised by several constituents about the removal of lights on the M1.

Lights on all junctions between Kilcock and Athlone on the M4/M6 Dublin-Galway road have also been turned off in the past year, and will be removed.

Lights are removed on slipways and on main roads at the approach to junctions.

The lighting energy reduction project has been underway for almost a decade. TII said it remains ongoing, but the next phase will mostly focus on replacing the remaining sodium lights with more efficient LED lights, a process that has also been underway for several years.

A review of the removal of lighting at 23 junctions in 2018 found there was no negative impact on safety. Comparing collision data from before and after the change, there was no difference in the proportion of collisions that occurred during hours of darkness. 

Comparing against a control group of junctions where lighting had not been removed, the review found no significant difference in safety.

Ó Murchú of Sinn Féin said a further safety assessment may be warranted.

“A number of people have brought it to my attention that suddenly they had to put on full beam [headlights] on the M1 and had visibility issues, especially coming up to exits,” the Louth TD said.

“I don’t want to overplay it but we need to make sure there’s an assessment made. We need to do everything from the point of view of decarbonisation and not using energy we don’t need to, but we also need to make our roads as safe as possible,” Ó Murchú said.

TII’s 2018 pilot research identified reductions of energy usage of approximately 70% per junction, as well as a cost saving to the state of around €11,000 per junction.

A 2021 TII note on the matter states: “Modern lighting standards for motorway junctions specify significantly less lighting than was the case pre-2007.

“Junctions procured after that time are constructed to the modern standard, whereas a significant cohort of Ireland’s motorway junctions pre-date those changes. Those older junctions have what may be deemed to be surplus lighting.”

The note adds that removing lighting poles from junctions reduces the risk of errant vehicles hitting poles.

“The environmental benefits of implementing the revised lighting design include substantial reductions in energy usage, associated carbon emissions and light pollution,” TII stated.