Cumbria County Council cabinet today agreed to spend an extra half-a-million pounds improving street lighting on Walney Island in Barrow and at Kells in Copeland.
Cabinet members today, Wednesday, 7th September, approved plans to spend £500,000 tackling specific electricity supply cabling problems and replacing street lighting columns in these areas.
The decision means that £400,000 will be used to replace and rewire up to 500 streetlights on Walney Island, while Kells, £100,000 will be spent tackling around 175 lights in Kells.
The expenditure is in addition to the money already allocated to these areas this year from capital funds for replacing lighting columns. In Barrow’s case, £116,000, and in Copeland's, £90,000.
Street lighting in Kells and on Walney Island suffer from the fact that many lights are on a "looped supply". This means that the cabling connects chains of streetlights to the electricity supply in such a way that, when one light fails, others down the chain go out because they deprived of power.
Jack Richardson, cabinet spokesman for transport and infrastructure, said: "We took the view that, while the situation in Cumbria is no worse than other areas nationally, there are two areas of particular concern at Walney and Kells. The problem here are so serious that that we have decided to take immediate action.
"This money will ring fenced for this use in these areas and it will be in addition to the funding already allocated to these areas for replacing lighting columns and we are looking for long-term solutions to the lighting issue across the whole county."