אדריכלות ישראלית

Street Furniture

Architecture of Israel #

108

February

2017

page

english

street furniture

cities are the sum

of our

mistakes - stop

signs

forcing us to look

left and right

(Hillel Schocken)

Serving as an arena for social encounters –

between locals and between the latter and

occasional strangers, the main function of

street furniture is to maximize the potential

of the place – architecturally, landscape-

wise, and culturally.

Likewise in interior design, street furniture is

meant to enhance implicit - natural or built -

potential of a place according to social and

cultural norms. As with any design, effort

is made here to ensure an effective ratio

between function and decoration.

Due to its visual effect, street lighting has

been the hallmark of a settlement since 15

BC. In the beginning, lighting took the form

of oil-burning torches; from the mid-18th

century, gas lamps; and from the mid-19th

century, electric bulbs. Florescent tubes,

developed in 1867 by Enri Becquerel, later

facilitated the development of neon lighting,

popular to this day in street lighting as well

as contemporary energy-saving bulbs.

The need to switch thousands of bulbs

on and off at the same time, make control

systems highly significant energy savers.

Today, this is carried out by photoelectric

sensors, solar lighting fixtures and

particularly by LED (light-emitting diode),

which significantly lowers the electricity bills

in light of the fact that street lighting uses

50% of overall electricity consumption.

The term furniture refers to satisfying the user's needs anddesires usingobjects that

support his activities. This refers to portable items that complement architecture,

whether in an apartment, office, or shop. However, while interior design refers to

specific users, the street represents many undefined users, most of whom are

occasional passersby. Originating in England, the term “street furniture” relates

to objects placed by the authorities in the public domain for the benefit of all.

This include benches, lighting, signs, bus or train stations, garbage facilities, and

natural or artificial shading devices.

Street signs are another light element that

have recently gained huge momentum in the

context of the communications revolution.

Here as well, LED has determined the

street’s character worldwide, thus increasing

the effect of globalism on local identity.

Based on low-voltage electricity transferred

by semi-conductive compounds, the great

advantage of LED is that it is capable of

producing a spectrum of colors according

to amperage change, from infra-red

developed at the end of the fifties’ for remote

control, through blue LED developed in the

seventies’, and the white LED that was

developed in the nineties’ by Japanese

electronic engineers, Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi

Amano and Shuji Nakamura.

Ensuring considerable energy-saving,

and a long shelf-life, LED is exploited by

the authorities as well as by commercial

bodies as part of the process of internalizing

virtual content in reality. In this context,

online information is announced (parking

availability for instance, combining videos

and visual effects, such as awe-inspiring

holograms, stealing the show from street

lighting, which pales in comparison with

gigantic screens situated at intersections

and exhibiting blinding light and colors.

As mentioned, the original British intention

was to enhance the street as a friendly

Architect Dr. Ami

Ran