There actually used to be a lot more of these poles including some double armed versions but over the years most were knocked down, in fact you can still see the remnants of the cast aluminium breakaway base with a new concrete pole next to it. See here
I read that RIDOT is planning more infrastructural upgrades so many of the older bridges from the 50s with 50s poles and 90s M-250R2s (mostly with long-dead lamps) will all be scrapped and forgotten. As long as they don't use LEDs...
Yeah all of the old davit poles here were taken down and replaced during roadwork this fall. The only ones left at the few on the bridge in the background.
I know parts of Toronto still have similar davit poles still in use but they're different than these since a they were designed for fluorescent lights instead of cobraheads and b they don't have the integrated breakaway base.
They replaced these poles with OVX's it doesn't look that great at all. Oh and those traffic signal arms here are interesting too but I don't know what they are.
Those traffic light arms are the only ones like that in the GTA. They're also called truss arms, I wish they didn't replace the CGEs with the plumbizer signal though.
Those Model 25s on the davits remind me of This RIDOT pole on I-95. It's one of only two Model 25s I was aware of in RIDOT's system. The other was on Rte 4 Here.
Yeah I think the bridge might be Mississauga. The one AE 125 there used to be a davit B2255. Maybe they left that one AE 125 to toronto because they installed the AE 125?
Wow only 2 Model 25s on your highways. Probably both were spot replacements? I wish they still used the Model 25. Theres arent many left on our highways either. A good chunk of them are at one on/off ramp here
Yeah not sure if they're spot replacements. Most of the drop lens 400W lights in RIDOT's system are M-400R2s, but that's mainly because they replaced a lot of the mismatched 400W HPS lights with M-400R2s in the 90s, I assume to unify things (perhaps since the 80s HPS lights had higher losses than the 90s ones?) but there are a fair number of 80s OVMs on that stretch of road. There's one (yes, ONE) American Electric 125 I knew of in RIDOT's system, but it's LED now. RIDOT used AE even less than the utility companies here, which didn't use them very much either. RIDOT seemed to have liked Cooper (OVM and OVS) a lot in the late 80s and by the 90s they were using M-250R2s and M-400R2s. They had a brief Cooper phase where they were using OVFs for new installations in the mid-2000s and I saw a few OVZs appear to spot replace drop lens 250W HPS lights.
Never saw any drop lens 400W Cooper lights though. They must've still used GE M-400s for drop lens, but they did not use them for FCO in the early-mid 2000s so who knows... I wasn't really paying attention to spot replacements at that time. I was paying more attention to their new installations (new poles, wiring, etc) that were replacing the miles and miles of non-working NGrid-owned freeway lights. The first major relight project where RIDOT replaced NGrid poles with their own was in 2004 On Rte 6. You can see the NGrid poles remained on the overpass (one still works but the rest are not powered; I wouldn't call them abandoned though). You can also see a nice OV-25 on one pole. It was missed in the 90s HPS takeover, where NECo (old utility before NGrid) was replacing all the freeway mercs with drop lens M-250R2s.
This was the second relight project I remember as a kid. Took place in 2005. Set the streetview to 2015 to see the LEDs there now. They recently replaced all the non-LeoTeks with LeoTeks though. This was the first interchange to be retrofitted to LED. Before this interchange, all prior LED fixtures were installed on new poles, replacing more NGrid lights that didn't work.
This was the third that I remember, taking place in 2006 or 2007 IIRC. This giant interchange actually was lit by 1000W MH highmasts, which were actually RIDOT-owned. But RIDOT only ever used highmasts in three cases and has eliminated two of those three (with plans to eventually eliminate the third, which is also 1000W MH). The second was 400W HPS and fell victim to a major interchange overhaul here. Some of the highmast poles are actually still up and still powered but most have been removed.
On I-295, Exits 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 10, and 11 were NGrid-lit. Today, only exits 3, 10, and 11 are NGrid-lit. Exits 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 are RIDOT-lit.
After that they stopped mass-replacing NGrid poles for awhile. In 2015 they upgraded this exit as well as this interchange and this half-interchange. they left Exit 3 as NGrid for whatever reason. They also used short poles with
... short arms like you see on the ramps instead of the taller poles. Dunno why they did that... Those exits (1, 2, and 4) on I-95 were one of the first new installations to use LEDs.
THIS was the very first installation of RIDOT LEDs. You can see the streetview was conveniently taken during the lighting overhaul. The truss pole to the far left of your screen right up in the foreground is an original late 50s truss arm that I think originally held a Form 400 Powerpack. The shiner pole to on the right in the foreground would be a newer NGrid spot replacement as well as the second pole back on the left.
The only NGrid-owned freeway lights left are Exit 3 on I-95, Exit 3 on I-295 (aka Exit 1 on Rte 37), a stretch of Rte 10 Exit 10 on I-295, Exit 11 on I-295, and Rte 146 from Eddie Dowling Highway to the MA state line. Exits 10 and 11 on I-295 and the lights on Rte 146 were BVE poles before NGrid bought out BVE and NECo. The BVE lights never have wiring issues and NGrid keeps them relatively well maintained. The old NECo poles though? FORGET IT! Those things have wiring issues left and right. NGrid is awful at keeping those on.
Depending on the city region jurisdiction, different fixtures were used for various wattage's. In my time Ive been around at the end of the R37, R47 replacement era and the rise of the OVX's lol. My region never really used Cooper until the 2000's. Now they just love them. OVZ's and OV-15 and 25's were the only Cooper lights it seems that were used. Now its the OVF, OVH, OVZ, and OVX. In Toronto for decades the replacement fixture has been the AE 125. Prior to that I think was the OV-25s. In Vaughan I see mostly OVFs for replacements, except now LED's seem to be the norm in most of my province. Seems LED is becoming popular Ridot.
We are opposite when it comes to freeway lighting . Highmasts go down in RI, meanwhile here they go up. If it were MTO operating those interchanges they would likely all be lit by highmasts
Were losing a bunch of Truss lights (some already gone such as this row.I assume there will be highmast installs along with this road work.
Another project of widening and creating HOT (high occupancy toll) lanes. Not sure whether all of the truss lights will be removed. Or some of them. Lots of highmasts already up
The last one I know of right now but I don't even know whats up here, but they replaced the median trust lights with wooden poles with tapered e arms over here by those Model 25s in my last comment.. I havent heard of any work being done there. It could even be because they wanted longer arms to span over both sides to provide more lighting. I don't see them using highmasts in that tiny little spot, but I would never underestimate it.
Why did they replace those truss poles with wooden poles with tapered ellipticals and an overhead feed? Were there wiring issues with the truss poles or something? They could have just attached the overhead feed to the truss poles. Heck, they've attached overhead feeds to ALUMINUM poles in New Hampshire and in RI too. Not on the freeway though. No overhead feeds allowed by RIDOT here. The overhead line poses a hazard should a pole be hit and the overhead feed will kill all the downstream poles if a pole gets hit and the line breaks. With the underground wiring, if a pole gets hit, the fuse in the manhole next to the pole will pop and disconnect the pole yet keep the rest of the lights going (at least in theory; it seems the lights like to go out in sections here, at least with the older NECo and older RIDOT installations. The BVE installations and the group-switched RIDOT installations don't seem to have issues.
When I look further into it. It ends at the steel poles with the truss lights. I don't know why other than maybe the wiring for them is failing and since they are out of date, they just put up these wooden poles? Maybe even see new steel poles in the near future? Not sure.
Like your saying with the pole knockdowns it would pose a threat to some circumstance.
Its the most bizarre thing ive ever seen in the MTO highways.
Did you note how they tied the overhead fed wood poles? Looks like some sort of big @$$ heavy duty extension cord lmao. I think it's actually liquid flex PVC though. they ran it across the guard rail to the first wood pole and used a big PVC splice box and ran the feed up the wood pole. They did the same thing at each overpass. It's still better than what RIDOT and NGrid does though (NOTHING! lol). They just leave them dead and if they do make repairs, they don't last more than a couple months.
what's weird is, if it was the wiring that was the issue, why didn't they just string the overhead feed using the existing truss poles? Seems like they made a lot more work (and expenses) for themselves. I assume the remaining truss poles alongside the shoulders of the freeway are dead at night?
These davits with M-250R2s are out cold every night. Ironically these are in RI's busiest highway (Interstate 95) right by the State House (RI's HQ basically). EVENTUALLY, this section of freeway is slated for major upgrades so the lights will likely be removed. So far they haven't LED'ed these lights either. If I see these working again at night I'll know that LEDs are on the way (and then they'll go out a month later like they always do due to shorts in the late 50s to mid 1960s wiring). If you're wondering what's up with the crazy far pole spacing, that's because there's supposed to be poles on the shoulders between each median mounted pole in an alternating fashion but they've all been knocked down over the years and never replaced. Over the years the bases have become buried in the ground so you can't even tell there was originally lights on the shoulders.
This section opened in 1968 and featured these cute little poles on the concrete wall. Those lights were replaced with M-400 FCOs on a relay system tied in with the new lights from when they realigned the freeway during a major bridge replacement project. I think the only reason they kept the poles is because they're a custom thing. Those poles are very short! So they used the truss poles as late as 1968, at least on I-195. I-95 had always used davits from the beginning, as did most RIDOT-lit freways.
This interchange on I-295 has confused me forever. They are indeed RIDOT poles (see the davit spot replacements? Also, RIDOT uses blue PCs, NGrid uses gray or brown, though some from the early 90s are light blue) and they're now LEDs. But the fact that they weren't originally davits puzzles me. Also, the ramps use these cool little truss arms. Another weird thing is that this interchange is the only originally-RIDOT-lit interchange on I-295. All the rest were originally lit by the electric companies (NECo and BVE back in the day, now NGrid). Both electric companies used truss poles originally, so maybe RIDOT wanted to match that?
Good observation! I didn't see that huge wire there, I wonder why they left the one steel pole. I remembered I seeing on the news about dixie rd and the QEW being rebuilt. The answer to these wooden poles? Very high likelihood of Highmasts in the near future... Heres the article, there is an animation of the existing truss lights and the proposed highmasts. Looks like the Model 25's on that one ramp there have a fighting chance according to the animation.
Why don't they ever upgrade the wiring? Is it original considering its from the 50's or 60's? I don't know how many codes have changed there. Here it seems they changed a lot in 1990s-2000s.. The highmasts were probably a number of different things such as: code update to either save energy and resources or maybe not enough lighting on the highways? Im not certain on what factors were in place. The spacing seems like a big thing down there LOL. I know of one truss light removed back in 2007 and hasn't been replaced since, over here. If you go to 2007 streetview there looks to be 2 GE M400's there.
Hehehe its funny with the concrete wall lights because they are just little stubby poles like so
Hmm maybe those model 25s will live on! (at least until they go LED one day?) RIDOT was going around group-replacing drop lens 400W lights with M-400 FCOs up until the time they started this LED retrofit earlier this year.
I'm not sure what goes on with the wiring. I do believe it's all original but I have no proof either way. But I do know that a lot of poles get knocked down (both NGrid and RIDOT) and never get replaced, so the bolts in the foundation rust out and water probably gets in the conduit opening in the foundation and causes problems. A lot of older RIDOT and NGrid systems are missing a quarter or more of their poles. RIDOT is pretty good about replacing poles on their newer systems but it's still a problem of theirs. NGrid is awful at replacing knocked down poles. Look at all the poles missing along this stretch! And to make it even worse, the one on the right side by the bridge in the background is currently gone!
That tapered pole is a NGrid pole but it's being used in a RIDOT system. That's a RIDOT light and it's wired to a RIDOT system. Originally there was a short-armed RIDOT truss there but the tapered pole was installed used as a replacement. RIDOT and NGrid both reuse old poles to replace freeway knockdowns. Somehow RIDOT ended up with a NGrid pole in their possession. I suppose it's not such a crazy thing since they could have done a construction project and removed the pole or something and then reinstalled it here.
Ah that pole you linked saying "nice light". That pole was saved during the reconstruction process. If you go back to 2011 you'll see all the longarm truss poles on the righthand side of the old bridge in the background. That bridge used to carry the freeway but they built a new bridge in between the two old ones and cut the old bridge in half down the middle and turned the remaining half into a bike path that goes over the river to connect both cities together. Pretty cool! And that boxy OV-15 you linked is still up, though it's been disconnected for a loooong time. You can sorta tell that there used to be an on-ramp behind the OV-15 that was eliminated during the reconstruction process. I only know of three other boxy OV-15s left in the entire state, one being 100W HPS FCO in BVE (NGrid) territory on a road and the others all being 250W HPS on RIDOT's system. There used to be way more but infrequent relamping courtesy of RIDOT killed most of them off. RIDOT has gotten MUCH better than they were 10 or more years ago. They used to relamp like once every 7 years. Now they do it like every two or three (spot relamping fixtures in a group; they wait three years, relamp only the dead ones, come back in another couple years and relamp those dead ones...)
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![[Gone] Silver AE 25s
Here's a trio of silver AE 25s on what I think are 60s era Powerlite poles.
Keywords: American_Streetlights](albums/userpics/normal_PA233698M.JPG "Click to view full size image
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[Gone] Silver AE 25s
Here's a trio of silver AE 25s on what I think are 60s era Powerlite poles.
Keywords: American_Streetlights")
I read that RIDOT is planning more infrastructural upgrades so many of the older bridges from the 50s with 50s poles and 90s M-250R2s (mostly with long-dead lamps) will all be scrapped and forgotten.
I know parts of Toronto still have similar davit poles still in use but they're different than these since a they were designed for fluorescent lights instead of cobraheads and b they don't have the integrated breakaway base.
Both have sadly been LED'ed.
Wow only 2 Model 25s on your highways. Probably both were spot replacements? I wish they still used the Model 25. Theres arent many left on our highways either. A good chunk of them are at one on/off ramp here
Never saw any drop lens 400W Cooper lights though. They must've still used GE M-400s for drop lens, but they did not use them for FCO in the early-mid 2000s so who knows... I wasn't really paying attention to spot replacements at that time. I was paying more attention to their new installations (new poles, wiring, etc) that were replacing the miles and miles of non-working NGrid-owned freeway lights. The first major relight project where RIDOT replaced NGrid poles with their own was in 2004 On Rte 6. You can see the NGrid poles remained on the overpass (one still works but the rest are not powered; I wouldn't call them abandoned though). You can also see a nice OV-25 on one pole. It was missed in the 90s HPS takeover, where NECo (old utility before NGrid) was replacing all the freeway mercs with drop lens M-250R2s.
This was the second relight project I remember as a kid. Took place in 2005. Set the streetview to 2015 to see the LEDs there now. They recently replaced all the non-LeoTeks with LeoTeks though. This was the first interchange to be retrofitted to LED. Before this interchange, all prior LED fixtures were installed on new poles, replacing more NGrid lights that didn't work.
This was the third that I remember, taking place in 2006 or 2007 IIRC. This giant interchange actually was lit by 1000W MH highmasts, which were actually RIDOT-owned. But RIDOT only ever used highmasts in three cases and has eliminated two of those three (with plans to eventually eliminate the third, which is also 1000W MH). The second was 400W HPS and fell victim to a major interchange overhaul here. Some of the highmast poles are actually still up and still powered but most have been removed.
In late 2009 they added lights at this interchange, which was built in 2001 and never had lights prior to that. Around the same time they replaced the NGrid poles at this interchange, which never had lights on the ramps (just the freeway portion and one light at each end of the ramps) and here at a dual-interchange. If you set the streetviews back to 2009 you can see the NGrid poles, which were spaced kinda far apart and many poles were missing.
On I-295, Exits 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 10, and 11 were NGrid-lit. Today, only exits 3, 10, and 11 are NGrid-lit. Exits 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 are RIDOT-lit.
After that they stopped mass-replacing NGrid poles for awhile. In 2015 they upgraded this exit as well as this interchange and this half-interchange. they left Exit 3 as NGrid for whatever reason. They also used short poles with
THIS was the very first installation of RIDOT LEDs. You can see the streetview was conveniently taken during the lighting overhaul. The truss pole to the far left of your screen right up in the foreground is an original late 50s truss arm that I think originally held a Form 400 Powerpack. The shiner pole to on the right in the foreground would be a newer NGrid spot replacement as well as the second pole back on the left.
The only NGrid-owned freeway lights left are Exit 3 on I-95, Exit 3 on I-295 (aka Exit 1 on Rte 37), a stretch of Rte 10 Exit 10 on I-295, Exit 11 on I-295, and Rte 146 from Eddie Dowling Highway to the MA state line. Exits 10 and 11 on I-295 and the lights on Rte 146 were BVE poles before NGrid bought out BVE and NECo. The BVE lights never have wiring issues and NGrid keeps them relatively well maintained. The old NECo poles though? FORGET IT! Those things have wiring issues left and right. NGrid is awful at keeping those on.
We are opposite when it comes to freeway lighting . Highmasts go down in RI, meanwhile here they go up. If it were MTO operating those interchanges they would likely all be lit by highmasts
Were losing a bunch of Truss lights (some already gone such as this row.I assume there will be highmast installs along with this road work.
Another project of widening and creating HOT (high occupancy toll) lanes. Not sure whether all of the truss lights will be removed. Or some of them. Lots of highmasts already up
The last one I know of right now but I don't even know whats up here, but they replaced the median trust lights with wooden poles with tapered e arms over here by those Model 25s in my last comment.. I havent heard of any work being done there. It could even be because they wanted longer arms to span over both sides to provide more lighting. I don't see them using highmasts in that tiny little spot, but I would never underestimate it.
Like your saying with the pole knockdowns it would pose a threat to some circumstance.
Its the most bizarre thing ive ever seen in the MTO highways.
what's weird is, if it was the wiring that was the issue, why didn't they just string the overhead feed using the existing truss poles? Seems like they made a lot more work (and expenses) for themselves. I assume the remaining truss poles alongside the shoulders of the freeway are dead at night?
These davits with M-250R2s are out cold every night. Ironically these are in RI's busiest highway (Interstate 95) right by the State House (RI's HQ basically). EVENTUALLY, this section of freeway is slated for major upgrades so the lights will likely be removed. So far they haven't LED'ed these lights either. If I see these working again at night I'll know that LEDs are on the way (and then they'll go out a month later like they always do due to shorts in the late 50s to mid 1960s wiring). If you're wondering what's up with the crazy far pole spacing, that's because there's supposed to be poles on the shoulders between each median mounted pole in an alternating fashion but they've all been knocked down over the years and never replaced. Over the years the bases have become buried in the ground so you can't even tell there was originally lights on the shoulders.
These long-arm truss poles are old RIDOT arms on I-195. You can see they use davits as spot replacements. The ramps have these tapered arms. I know the first lights on I-95 in 1957 were davits. And this stretch of Interstate 195 opened in 1959, so they must've been using these and the davits.
This section opened in 1968 and featured these cute little poles on the concrete wall. Those lights were replaced with M-400 FCOs on a relay system tied in with the new lights from when they realigned the freeway during a major bridge replacement project. I think the only reason they kept the poles is because they're a custom thing. Those poles are very short! So they used the truss poles as late as 1968, at least on I-195. I-95 had always used davits from the beginning, as did most RIDOT-lit freways.
This interchange on I-295 has confused me forever. They are indeed RIDOT poles (see the davit spot replacements? Also, RIDOT uses blue PCs, NGrid uses gray or brown, though some from the early 90s are light blue) and they're now LEDs. But the fact that they weren't originally davits puzzles me. Also, the ramps use these cool little truss arms. Another weird thing is that this interchange is the only originally-RIDOT-lit interchange on I-295. All the rest were originally lit by the electric companies (NECo and BVE back in the day, now NGrid). Both electric companies used truss poles originally, so maybe RIDOT wanted to match that?
Even more interesting is that this tapered elliptical is definitely a NECo (NGrid) pole. It's a spot replacement, since they used those odd short-arm trusses originally. But this is a RIDOT interchange. Somehow RIDOT ended up with a NECo pole and used it as a spot replacement along with the davits lol.
Why don't they ever upgrade the wiring? Is it original considering its from the 50's or 60's? I don't know how many codes have changed there. Here it seems they changed a lot in 1990s-2000s.. The highmasts were probably a number of different things such as: code update to either save energy and resources or maybe not enough lighting on the highways? Im not certain on what factors were in place. The spacing seems like a big thing down there LOL. I know of one truss light removed back in 2007 and hasn't been replaced since, over here. If you go to 2007 streetview there looks to be 2 GE M400's there.
Hehehe its funny with the concrete wall lights because they are just little stubby poles like so
Nice light there
That tapered pole GE looks like a newer RIDOT light or an old NGrid light, I see a blue PC
I'm not sure what goes on with the wiring. I do believe it's all original but I have no proof either way. But I do know that a lot of poles get knocked down (both NGrid and RIDOT) and never get replaced, so the bolts in the foundation rust out and water probably gets in the conduit opening in the foundation and causes problems. A lot of older RIDOT and NGrid systems are missing a quarter or more of their poles. RIDOT is pretty good about replacing poles on their newer systems but it's still a problem of theirs. NGrid is awful at replacing knocked down poles. Look at all the poles missing along this stretch! And to make it even worse, the one on the right side by the bridge in the background is currently gone!
That tapered pole is a NGrid pole but it's being used in a RIDOT system. That's a RIDOT light and it's wired to a RIDOT system. Originally there was a short-armed RIDOT truss there but the tapered pole was installed used as a replacement. RIDOT and NGrid both reuse old poles to replace freeway knockdowns. Somehow RIDOT ended up with a NGrid pole in their possession. I suppose it's not such a crazy thing since they could have done a construction project and removed the pole or something and then reinstalled it here.
Ah that pole you linked saying "nice light". That pole was saved during the reconstruction process. If you go back to 2011 you'll see all the longarm truss poles on the righthand side of the old bridge in the background. That bridge used to carry the freeway but they built a new bridge in between the two old ones and cut the old bridge in half down the middle and turned the remaining half into a bike path that goes over the river to connect both cities together. Pretty cool! And that boxy OV-15 you linked is still up, though it's been disconnected for a loooong time. You can sorta tell that there used to be an on-ramp behind the OV-15 that was eliminated during the reconstruction process. I only know of three other boxy OV-15s left in the entire state, one being 100W HPS FCO in BVE (NGrid) territory on a road and the others all being 250W HPS on RIDOT's system. There used to be way more but infrequent relamping courtesy of RIDOT killed most of them off. RIDOT has gotten MUCH better than they were 10 or more years ago. They used to relamp like once every 7 years. Now they do it like every two or three (spot relamping fixtures in a group; they wait three years, relamp only the dead ones, come back in another couple years and relamp those dead ones...)