The design of the columns is exclusive for Benidorm, which has entailed "a great previous work of industrial development"
Benidorm begins the placement of the new streetlights on Paseo de Levante
This morning the first eight columns for new streetlights of the new catenary on Paseo de Levante have arrived, to renovate them completely. The placement of these columns, which is being carried out by the contractor company SICE, began today and will coexist with the old ones for a few days.
The new streetlights will arrive in the following few dates in batches of eight until a total of 44 will be placed in this first phase. The placement work in the new location has already begun, as Mayor Toni Pérez has been able to verify 'in situ' during a visit this morning. Starting tomorrow they will be connected to the street lighting and the wiring will be installed. On Friday the old columns will begin to be removed.
The order for these new columns was processed a few months ago, but as the Engineering department has clarified, their design and production have involved many hours of work. "There is a lot of previous industrial development work since they are non-standardized elements and made exclusively for Benidorm," said the mayor.
The design of the columns includes a dodecagonal post of 11 meters and five millimeters thick and a cone of the upper spear of three meters, which gives a total height of the set of 14 meters. Each one will have a crosshead for two projectors and another one to hold the catenary garlands. The finish is a white-baked thermo-lacquer.
On the other hand, last week the placement of the new concrete benches that are located on the promenade, which incorporate the control panels and the electrical connections of the lampposts, was completed.
The overall intervention for the renovation of the lighting of the Paseo de Levante represents an investment of 1,972,119.41 euros that will be financed with municipal resources charged to the treasury remnants as it is a financially sustainable project, since the reduction of the energy power, once the intervention is finished, will be 33.65%. Forecasts suggest that before Easter the renovation will be completed and the new catenary operational.
Despite being a long-awaited action, "the road has been full of difficulties because we demanded that the Ministry carry out the work as it falls within their competence, but their refusal to do so led the City Council to undertake it on their own," he explained. the mayor, who added that "even so, the journey to obtain the authorization has been very tortuous".
“We could not tolerate that due to the negligence of the central government, it was not understood that the catenary and the lighting of Levante is much more than a lighting; it is an icon that must move forward and innovate and, therefore, must be replaced after more than 30 years since it was placed”, stated the mayor.
And it is that the Levante catenary dates from the 90s of the last century and presents elements with a significant state of deterioration that have reached the end of their useful life. "For this reason and the need to adapt the outdoor lighting infrastructures to the Energy Efficiency Regulation is why it was decided to undertake the comprehensive renovation of the catenary" Pérez indicated.
A good part of the columns present widespread corrosion and the structural capacity of these elements was even in question, according to the technical reports. Deterioration in the form of cracks and fissures in the anchoring of the columns and signs of oxidation in the steel cables had also been detected, which could affect their tensile capacity.
