Non-Working Streetlights Keep Areas In the Dark

If you've been in the dark lately, you're not alone.

The Downtown Cluster of Congregations found 125 inoperable streetlights during a recent walk-through in Chinatown and the area surrounding the Verizon Center. A D.C. Department of Transportation official was present for the tour.

After Terry Lynch, executive director of the Downtown Cluster of Congregations, complained about the 125 problem lights in an e-mail to Michelle Pourciau, DDOT's acting director, the department said it would consider hiring a new contractor to handle maintenance of the District's streetlights.

Eighty-eight of those lights have been repaired, said Erik Linden, spokesman for DDOT. Of the remainder, 25 have cable or conduit problems that take longer to fix, and 12 are part of development projects and outside the department's jurisdiction.

"This problem has been festering for some time," Lynch said.

Since the August 2004 murder of a Dupont Circle waiter, he said, the Downtown Cluster has made an effort to raise safety issues related to D.C. streets.

"If lights are out, people don't feel safe," Lynch said. Criminals "take advantage of a dark location."

The current maintenance contract does not contain a night inspection clause, according to an e-mail sent to Lynch from Douglas Noble, DDOT's associate director and chief traffic engineer for DDOT. DDOT relies on citizen requests for streetlight repairs that come in on the mayor's hotline, as well as night inspections by DDOT staff, citywide inspections in the spring and fall, and spot checks in various neighborhoods.

But those requests and inspections do not provide a response that is fast enough for Miles Groves, a Penn Quarter resident. He complained that it once took nine months for the light in the alley behind his house to be fixed.

"It takes many, many months to get things done," Groves said.

Some of the problems are incandescent lights, which do not have a long life and account for 5,000 of the 61,266 street and alley lights in the city, Linden said. Incandescent lights have to be replaced every six months.

"The goal is to phase those out as much as possible," Linden said.

The rest of the city's streetlights use either high-pressure sodium, metal halide or mercury lighting, all of which last longer and are more cost effective.

Other problems stem from cable or conduit repairs, which can take up to 60 days.

"We're constantly monitoring the streetlight issue," said Linden. "We can't be everywhere. We appreciate people like Terry, anyone who can help us out."

And while Lynch said he values the city's efforts to improve street lighting, he also takes a wait-and-see attitude.

"The city has shown a short-term sensitivity to the issue," he said. "Whether that gets sustained is a whole other question."