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Following is a question by the Hon Raymond Ho and a written reply by the Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works, Dr Sarah Liao, at the Legislative Council meeting today (October 18) :
Question:
It has been reported that the Highways Department launched a pilot scheme on power saving early this year whereby the brightness of about 3 000 street lights along three road sections is reduced by 10% to 25% at night. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) how the rate of traffic accidents of the relevant road sections before the pilot scheme was launched compares to the rate thereafter;
(b) if the rate of traffic accidents of the relevant road sections has risen, whether the authorities will immediately terminate the pilot scheme to safeguard the safety of the public; and
(c) as the pilot scheme only targets roads of the L3 illumination level, whether the authorities plan to extend the pilot scheme to cover roads of other illumination levels; if so, of the roads (road sections) involved?
Reply:
Madam President,
The Highways Department (HyD) launched the Central Dimming System Scheme as one of the energy saving pilot schemes between December 2005 and May 2006. The Electronic Ballasts for Dimming Scheme, the other energy saving pilot scheme, commenced in January 2006.
For the purpose of road light design, HyD generally divides lighting into four classes (L1, L2, L3 and L4) according to road planning classifications. L1 is for expressways, L2 for trunk roads, L3 for district distributors and L4 for local streets. Most of the 3,100 or so road lights involved in the two energy saving pilot schemes belong to the L3 class.
To implement the pilot schemes, HyD selected about 1,600 road lights along 101 road sections in Kowloon and New Territories East under the Central Dimming System Scheme. About 1,500 road lights along 14 road sections on Lantau Island and New Territories West were selected for the Electronic Ballasts for Dimming Scheme.
For both pilot schemes, road light luminance was lowered by 10% from switch-on time to midnight, by 25% from midnight to 5am, and by 10% from 5am to switch-off time.
The reply to Dr Hon Raymond HO's question is as follows:
(1) According to the information provided by the Transport Department (TD), during the implementation of the two pilot schemes, only 20 out of the 115 concerned road sections saw a rise in the number of accidents at nighttime compared to the figures for the same period in the previous year. The number of accidents for the remaining road sections either remained unchanged or actually decreased .
(2) To understand how road users adjusted and reacted to the pilot schemes, HyD conducted on-site surveys during the implementation of the pilot schemes to collect their views. The findings reveal that the two pilot schemes did not have any significant impact on road users.
There are many causes for traffic accidents. So far, there is no evidence indicating that the traffic accidents at the road sections under the pilot schemes are related to the level of luminance. In fact, even for those sections where the number of accidents has increased, the level of luminance meets the design standards.
HyD will continue to liaise closely with the Police and TD. Improvement measures will be taken immediately should there be any sign of luminance problem at individual sections.
(3) Most of the road sections under the two pilot schemes belong to the L3 class, with a few L2 and L4 sections. HyD will continue to monitor the number of accidents of the concerned sections and conduct other analyses before deciding on the way forward for the pilot schemes (including whether to extend the schemes to road sections of other luminance classes), so as to achieve satisfactory energy saving level without creating any impact on road users.
Ends/Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Issued at HKT 12:13
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