Street Lighting Project

Beginning in March 2006, a committee of local residents have been meeting to learn what is required to deal with areas within the community that do not have sufficient or appropriate nighttime street lighting. As many Windsor Square residents know, there have been longstanding problems with illicit activity that takes place after dark on unlighted streets in the neighborhood. Many years ago, our neighbors in Hancock Park did a comprehensive upgrading of the lights on their streets. For Windsor Square, however, we still have portions of some streets with no street lights at all, particularly on the east-west streets – First, Second, Fourth, and Fifth.

The increasing incidences of people loitering on bus benches and neighborhood streets only compound the longtime problems of prostitutes from adjacent business districts directing their customers to drive them to dark sections of our family neighborhoods. Police statistics show a 50% decrease in crime when adequate street lights are in place. Our Windsor Square Street Lighting Committee has studied the entire area between Hancock Park and Wilton Place, from Beverly to Wilshire Boulevards. Based on residents’ requests and complaints forwarded by the Fourth District Council Office to the Association, plus the committee’s own detailed surveys, the committee developed a map of areas where it believes lighting improvements should be made.

Based on the committee’s careful analyses of specific neighborhoods with particular lighting challenges, we believe our Windsor Square and Ridgewood-Wilton communities need approximately 206 new, replacement, or additional ornamental concrete street lights.

We believe that it is important for interested neighbors to attend future meetings of the committee not only to learn about the benefits of the proposed street lighting projects, but also to learn about the process for obtaining these improvements. Because the property owners receive the benefits, the property owners (or our successors if we sell) are the ones who pay for the improvements. Please come to a meeting and learn the details of the process, which involves the Bureau of Street Lighting conducting a straw poll of the property owners, followed by an actual mail-in vote of the owners if the straw poll indicates strong enough interest in the project.

New Lighting Cost Assessment

The Street Lighting Committee is hopeful that the City’s Bureau of Street Lighting will conduct the official “Straw Poll” (by mail) in early December to confirm community interest in the street lighting improvements proposed by the WSA after two years of meetings and study. The study’s conclusions show that the per-household cost to light up First, Second, Fourth, and Fifth Streets will be about $27 per month, or less than $1 per day, over ten years. (And it will cost about 35% less if paid in a single installment.) There also will be an option for those residents of “Project Area C” to vote for a completely-redesigned system of lights on their north-south streets at an additional cost to them of about $710 per year.