THE Penampang Municipal Council (PMC) is considering installing additional streetlights in parts of a commercial centre, while Kota Kinabalu City Hall (DBKK) has pledged to step up maintenance of public lighting in a Karamunsing neighbourhood.
This action follows feedback about the safety hazards posed by the unlit roads at both properties.
A proprietor at the Towering Industrial Centre bemoaned the lack of illumination on the roads which ran behind the different blocks, as well as the open space off Lorong Baginda.
He feared that unscrupulous parties might take advantage of this situation to break into the shops or carry out some misdeeds on those who went on foot in these areas at night.
A Karamunsing homeowner, meanwhile, spoke out about the poor driving experience on Jalan Sang Kancil 1 and Jalan Sang Kancil 2 after dark as both stretches have been pitch black for some time.
These individuals provided Hotline with the pertinent details, regarding their grievances, which were forwarded to the relevant agencies.
A Council spokesman said it planned to spruce up the lighting around the Towering Industrial Centre, once it had the requisite funds to do so.
“Our personnel inspected roads around the blocks and the one near the open space to identify potential places where these amenities might be sited,” he said.
He said a proposal to obtain solar streetlights for the common areas in these places would be submitted to the agency’s administration.
“Our superiors will have to determine how best to proceed on this matter.”
While waiting for a decision to be made on the lighting-improvements, the spokesman said action was taken to attend to the any of the existing amenities which were out of order.
He said the bulbs for four lights on the verge at one part of the Centre were found to be faulty and replaced on the spot.
“The Council’s technicians also checked on the components at the base of each of the ten lights in this area.”
A sky-master was deployed to facilitate these efforts, according to him.
Technical problems were also to blame for the outage of the lights on the two housing roads in Karamunsing, according to a spokesman for City Hall’s Engineering Department.
“Cable-leakage was found to be occurring on Jalan Sang Kancil 1,” he said.
“Our contractor isolated the fault, before making the necessary repairs. The system was later restored to normal operation.”
He said the contractor’s team also attended to the damaged fixtures servicing some of the lights.
“They changed a 100watt ballast, ignitor and high-pressure sodium bulb here.”
A “ballast” regulated the electrical current to the lanterns and provided sufficient voltage to start the lanterns, according to him
He said an “ignitor”, meanwhile, functioned as a starter to increase the initial voltage to make the lanterns glow.
In the case of Jalan Sang Kancil 2, the spokesman said the technicians replaced a 100W high-pressure sodium bulb which had blown.
“The lights on both roads were kept under observation for a time afterwards to ensure that the illumination remained stable.”
He said there were about 15 of these amenities on Jalan Sang Kancil 1 which spanned a distance of 537.7metres and three on Jalan Sang Kancil 2 which extended for some 117.7m.
When asked how often maintenance was carried on the streetlights around Penampang and the State Capital, the spokesmen said there was no fixed schedule for this work.
“The lights are attended as and when it becomes necessary to do so,” they said.
