Anyone remember when every block or 2 had a yellow street light and that ment there was a fire or police box mounted on that pole?

Yes! There was one right in front of my house growing up.

These were usually at a major intersection. I was fascinated by these as a child.

In addition to the yellow street light indicating a fire alarm or police call box, how many remember that a 3 foot or so white stripe near top of the poles indicated a bus or trolley stop.

How long ago was this? My memory only takes me back to the late sixties.

For me Murphman it was in the early 70's in West Rogers Park, and the north side. If you look up on most main streets you can still see the copper cables that were part of that network. I imagine it is still working to alarm schools and other public buildings.

Thanks, Ill have to take note of this. I suppose my powers of observation took a holiday back then.

From what I remember pre mid 1970's all the Chicago street lights (Except the Yellow lights) were white. Many street lights were replaced to what they mostly have now.Orange sodium vapor lights because the light is actually brighter and the rays of light spread out more so people could see better at night. Many residents complained saying the new lights lit up their homes and caused light pollution. Some still complain and want them removed.

I remember the side street lights were dim incandescents, and then the City installed poletop ballasts and mercury-vapor lamps. I do know that the yellow lights were mercury-vapor lamps with a yellow lens.

The current lamps are high-pressure sodium-vapor units, but there are some new poles being installed along Elston Avenue, northwest of Leclaire, with what appear to be warm white LED luminaires. The contractor is also removing every other pole, an artifact of the old trolley bus operation up to the Forest Glen bus yard. They're brighter, but more directional,

[b]Yes I remember it all. I'm 78 years old and can remember the late 30's a little and the 40's pretty well.[/b]

The story I heard about the sodium-vapor lighting is that it was installed because they were brighter than other sources, didn't require rewiring the city or installing new poles. People have told me (which I don't think is true, as other cities have them as well) that pilots could always tell Chicago by the orange glow.

LSD has the new white one's, the LED source, on the new poles on the south side and old poles on the north side. A lot more of them seem to be out at any one time (after the initial install period) than the old ones. Course, that could just be the wiring and such, not the LED source itself.

I think that Boston has glowing red lights at their fire call boxes (even gas sometimes) in the older parts of the city. I think paranoia due to their city fires and explosions from them (they also used explosives to stem one and it didn't work). My cousin was braising a pork loin and didn't hear the firemen knocking due to the hard-wired alarm (required in multi-family buildings in Bwoston) and they smashed in his door. Ooops. Anyways, how's that for a major digression and thread-jacking (there's an actual term for that, isn't there)?

The high pressure sodium-vapor lighting takes less electric to run them as well as being brighter than the mercury vapor lights. I can remember installing these were I worked in the late 1970's. The ones I installed were Kenall Light Fixtures.

On the south side of Chicago in the mid 1970's, I remember seeing some longer yellow light fixtures around Harlem and I-55. They were a deeper yellow than the high pressure sodium-vapor lighting. I never saw any of these on the north side. Completely different light fixture.

Sorry for going a bit off-topic here...

@ rjmachon:
the longer fixtures you mentioned most likely were having low-pressure sodium lamps inside . These are long lamps (1 to 3 feet, depending on power) and give off a deep, mono-chromomatic orange/yellow light. Low-pressute sodium lamps are even more efficient than the compact, high-pressure variety. These lamps can still be seen in Chicago on several elevated CTA platforms as well as under some expressway underpasses. At turn-on, these lamp first burn bright red for around 10 minutes before turning yellow. Sheffield avenue in Hammond -just across the Il/In statline still has a whole bunch of them.

@ davey7:
the majority of outages of new installed lights are not so much due to fixture faults but due to old, neglected wiring infrastructure. Early 2011, I was part of a troubleshoot team to investigate outages at S. Western and N. Lake Shore when the city of Chicago had the new "white" discharge lamps + fixtures installed. A considerable amount did not work, sometimes a whole block was out. We found blown fuses, snapped overhead wires lying on the sidewalk, loose wires broken by nearby tree branches, wires having damages insulation inside the pole and faulty dusk switches. Some poles were live and thus dangerous to touch! Most of the -hamfisted- electrical infrastructure dates back to the 50s/60s but the harsh Chicago climate is able to wreck everything if given enough time...

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/10/11/new-streetlights-failing-costing-money-on-lake-shore-drive/

Thanks MisterDrexciya!

MisterDrexciya Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sorry for going a bit off-topic here...
>
> @ davey7:
> the majority of outages of new installed lights
> are not so much due to fixture faults but due to
> old, neglected wiring infrastructure. Early 2011,
> I was part of a troubleshoot team to investigate
> outages at S. Western and N. Lake Shore when the
> city of Chicago had the new "white" discharge
> lamps + fixtures installed. A considerable amount
> did not work, sometimes a whole block was out. We
> found blown fuses, snapped overhead wires lying on
> the sidewalk, loose wires broken by nearby tree
> branches, wires having damages insulation inside
> the pole and faulty dusk switches. Some poles were
> live and thus dangerous to touch! Most of the
> -hamfisted- electrical infrastructure dates back
> to the 50s/60s but the harsh Chicago climate is
> able to wreck everything if given enough time...
>
> http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/10/11/new-streetl
> ights-failing-costing-money-on-lake-shore-drive/

Also/even South Lake Shore Drive is afflicted and that has all new light poles and infrastructure (not brand spanking new, but about 10-15 years now I guess). But yeah, I'm not surprised the infrastructure. It really needs to be renewed.