As one of mayor Bloomberg's last initiatives in office, the city of New York will replace 250,000 streetlights with light-emitting diode lamps by 2017. The conversion to LED lights has already begun in Central Park, among other areas of the city. LED fixtures sustain themselves for up to twenty years, as opposed to the average six-year life of sodium lights, thereby decreasing maintenance costs.
The city will put out an initial $70 million for the replacement project, which would be recovered in energy and maintenance savings within six years. The project in plan is expected to reduce power and maintenance cost by as much as $14 million per year.
New York was the first major American city to use LED in traffic signals and are currently installed on the Williamsburg and Ed Koch Queensborough Bridges.
The new lights are manufactured by American Electric Lighting.
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