Gaslight Fire In The Glen (Ridge)

Annette,

This Gas Lamp is on Woodland Ave, not in The Glen (The Glen is the park that runs along Toney's Brook in Glen Ridge, there aren't any Gas Lamps there).

New Headline please Annette.

I suggest

Gaslight Fire In The Ridge

OK, OK you win.

These lamps are wasting precious natural gas. They should be replace by sodium vapor lamps immediately!

What kind of lights would you get from sodium vapor?

extremely, ultra, mondo bright lights.

They are good for discouraging crime!

Thank you Annette!

South Orange replaced their gas lamp "bulbs" with some nasty looking alternative, most likely high pressure sodium. They look awful. Using real gas lamps does not seem like it uses a significant amount of natural gas that it would warrant the switch. Also, they increase property values.

..and the electricity to operate said sodium vapor lamps comes from what....a fossil fuel of some kind? Is it possible that the burning of gas to create light at the source of combustion is more efficient than burning coal to create steam, turn a generator, and transmit the electricity created a large distance, losing energy at each step? I'm guessing that creating and maintaining the electrical infrastructure is more costly in money and energy than is gas piping. I don't have the facts, but I'd be interested in seeing them before declaring that burning gas in a streetlight was a waste. Personally, I'd go back to candles made from animal renderings, creating new civil service jobs; lamplighters.

The gaslights in GR always bring to mind the immortal line from Marathon Man. "Is it safe?"

Sodium vapor lamps (at least the low pressure variety) aren't super-bright; they're just super-efficient. And spectrally pure. Pure yellow.

I don't mind them, but some people do. What bothers me more are street lights pointed in directions other than at the ground. Light pollution is bad enough as it is.

I went on a business trip to rural Nevada. It is amazing how much of the sky we miss here in Jersey.