Visual Performance, Comfort and Pleasantness for Pedestrians, Cyclists and Residents

Abstract

It is important that the lighting of residential roads promotes the safety, security and visual guidance of pedestrians, cyclists and moped riders, in addition to that afforded to motorised traffic. The real problem as far as the safety of the former group is concerned lies with possible hazardous irregularities in the pavement, such as holes, cracks, bumps, and protruding kerb stones. A suitable horizontal illuminance is required to make these clearly visible. Also, many pedestrians feel scared after dark. Sufficiently high brightnesses in the street and its surroundings will enable them to see at a glance the whole area, thus contributing to a feeling of security (both actual and perceived). The brightness needed is dependent not only on the illuminance level but also on the spectrum of the light source employed. Apart from getting an overview of the whole area, it is also important that the pedestrian should receive sufficient visual information regarding other persons in that area. Facial recognition or identification possibilities improve with increase of semi-cylindrical illuminance. Visual orientation in complete darkness is impossible, as is therefore the ability to find our way. Good visual orientation implies the ability to identify houses and other buildings and features of the environment. A suitable measure for this to be possible is the illuminance on the surrounding facades. From the point of view of comfort and pleasantness, the aspects of spatial brightness and colour quality of the light sources again play an important role, as do the restriction of discomfort glare and the visual impact of the installation during the daytime. As was explained in Chap. 2 "Basic lighting parameters", the lighting parameter for this category of users is in most cases illuminance.