Why use many streetlights when one will do? (Austin's Moontowers) [YouTube] [video]

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22 points·lsllc··11 comments

For a suburban setting, those towers are pretty ugly, and I wonder about the quality of the LED emission spectrum. I always appreciated the monochromatic yellow of sodium vapor lamps. I have noticed that some new streetlights have a striking blue-white light, I imagine that is to wake drivers up. I wonder what streetlights would be like with direct-emission monochromatic red LEDs like 1980s alarm clocks; they would less disrupting to sleep.

Is it that light that keeps trees nearby green into the autumn?

Is tethered drone lighting a thing? Seems like a thin wire with a high voltage going to eight propellers and a set of LED panels would be quite efficient and flexible.

And loud.

Why not a balloon then?

Heavy rain, hail and wind or storms would bring those to an end.

I mean blimp is surely the answer there if we're going down that route.

All great points, thank you.

Blimp requires far more maintenance. Rain is manageable, heavy storms and winds you just park it or lower it when needed. For urban centers, blimp moonlighting seems like a really neat feature. Could even do "digital projection" to focus light on desired areas.

Noise can be reduced because the fan blades can be larger and spin slower, does not need to be compact.

I wonder if they are less disruptive to moth navigation being higher than they are likely to fly.

Even from the javacript-less thumbnail I can tell that is many lights.

Always fun to point those out to folks not familiar with Austin

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