Anybody noticed security lights turned off - cost of living crisis?

[felicitycities]

I've noticed this is in the past week that a lot of my local area, aside from street lighting, is in darkness. People are switching off their security lights. Not everyone, but enough to have made a noticeable difference.

Concerning is my elderly neighbours who had them installed after a spate of burglaries in the local area. Now they're off completely. On the plus side (lighthearted) my next door neighbour has one of those sensor lights that goes off when a car passes and that is no longer on.

I understand people are trying to save money where they can, but I always thought the cost of lighting was quite low, and security must be the highest priority. We've had two attempted break ins over the years so mine are staying on.

I think I worry about the impact of this, re. crime. Anyway, I just wondered if others had noticed this in their local area.

People would be bloody stupid to do that, they cost pennies per year

Lights don’t cost that much but if they are struggling I can see why they might do that.

We've got outside lights down the side of our house which stay on all night. They've got 2w LED bulbs in, which are as close to free to run as makes no difference. That's the way to go for people who are really worried about electricity bills.

A bit off topic but from an evidence base the best thing you can do security wise is have complete darkness rather the security lights: it means that anybody with bad intentions has to use a torch, and somebody creeping around with a torch is far more likely to attract attention than a security light which your neighbours become inured to as it’s on and off with every passing cat / fox / moth. Our neighbour’s must flash on several times a night; I’ve never once bothered to investigate why.

I’ve not seen this no, I think most people know the cost is negligible. Here anyway.

Can you link to that evidence please? Because it seems illogical to me. And they don’t need a torch, most burglars can operate under the cover of dark and street lighting and neighbouring houses provide enough ambient light to allow it. It’s seldom so dark you can’t see anything. It’s a burgalers dream to operate under the cover of darkness. They will only use the torch when in the property itself.

I'm thinking about mentioning it to a couple of people locally, perhaps with a view to starting a discussion in the local groups.

What's the study?

I know they sometimes go off sometimes when a cat or fox crosses the garden but we only have a sensor in the back and if someone was there attempting to drill into our window locks (they made holes with something anyway) the security light might deter them, and it would go off repeatedly while they stayed there.

Static lights elsewhere are meant to deter. We use energy saving bulbs in those, and haven't changed them for years.

Modern LED ones are cheap as chips to run, but the older halogen floodlight type security lights can have 500W bulbs - at the current capped rate that’s almost 15p an hour, or maybe £1 a night - £350 a year. These lights tend to be a bit high up to reach, so if you’re elderly/limited mobility swapping the bulb out isn’t necessarily easy. I can see why they’d just not use theM. Or, it could just be that the nights are so light at the moment they’re not needed?

I've often thought this "should" be the case. If you light an area, you're just lighting their way, but AFAIK, all the evidence suggests that turning the lights off increases crime. Definitely here, when the council started turning street lights off after midnight there was a spike in crime and they had to concede and turn them back on, so I'd be interested to see your evidence.

Or, it could just be that the nights are so light at the moment they’re not needed?

It might be for some, quite possibly. It just seems like too much of a coincidence. One small row looks to be in darkness.

The elderly neighbours used to leave their lights (approx 4-5 of them) on when they went on holiday, constantly, if that's not a drip feed. Definitely in previous summers. They're very bright white indeed, so whether they're the led or halogen kind I'm not sure. Now they're not on at all.

I think our sensor light is halogen, but it never goes off unless triggered so doesn't cost anything much, I shouldn't think.

It's the other way around in my town. More and more people have security lights and cameras because the council decided to save money by switching off all the streetlights at midnight every night. The rate of crime here is rising at a terrifying speed.

I haven't noticed any difference, unfortunately the people behind us still have their light blazing right into my bedroom

Everyone I know who has been burgled has had it happen during the day anyway, when I presume people are most likely to be out.