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SMART LIGHTS FOR SMART CITIES

Funded by the Department of Energy’s Energy Efficiency and Conservation grant program, the Smart Lights for Smart Cities initiative has installed more than 5,000 street lights in 25 metropolitan area communities. The initiative targets smaller communities with populations less than 35,000.

Many cities and counties in the Kansas City metropolitan area use inefficient mercury and high-pressure sodium street lighting. MARC’s Smart Lights test program is showcasing different technologies, primarily Light-Emitting Diode (LED) street lighting, and vendors demonstrating the benefits of changing to another lighting system first-hand.

Utilities want to know whether high-efficiency streetlights are a promising long-term technology. Municipalities want to be sure that the energy savings and costs LEDs can provide are sustainable enough to not only compensate for start-up costs, but also that they add value to public safety or the community character.

To help in this effort, MARC is gathering feedback through the use of town hall-style meetings in some of the cities using the new lights, and also through our online engagement page Many Voices One Region. Please share your opinion of the high-efficiency streetlight color, brightness and impact on safety as a motorist or pedestrian. Help us determine if our metro-area can glean the long-term benefits of streetlight conversion to high-efficiency fixtures and transform the local streetlight market.

For more information about the Smart Lights for Smart Cities program, read this Fact Sheet.

Click on the links below to see a map of streetlight locations.

Kansas Partners / Participants

Leavenworth County, Kansas

• City of Basehor
• City of Lansing
• City of Tonganoxie

Wyandotte County, Kansas

• City of Edwardsville

Johnson County, Kansas

• City of Fairway
• City of Gardner
• City of Merriam
• City of Mission
• City of Prairie Village
• City of Roeland Park
• City of Spring Hill
• City of Westwood

Missouri Partners / Participants

Cass County, Missouri

• City of Harrisonville
• City of Peculiar
• City of Pleasant Hill
• City of Raymore

Clay County, Missouri

• City of Gladstone
• City of Kearney
• City of Lawson
• City of Liberty
• City of Smithville (north Smithville) (south Smithville)

Jackson County, Missouri

• City of North Kansas City
• City of Oak Grove
• City of Raytown

Platte County, Missouri

• City of Platte City
  

• UTILITIES PARTNERS/PARTICIPANTS
  Kansas City Power & Light
  Platte – Clay Electric Cooperative
  Westar Energy

This material is based on work supported in part by the Department of Energy Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy under Grant Award Number DE-EE0003801 from the EECBG Program made available pursuant to the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (RECOVERY ACT).