"We used your site occasionally when we were looking to replace out some lamp posts in Cardiff, Chester and Westminster, (Liverpool, Kensington and Chelsea and others never happened - well the plug was pulled after we had bought the lighting columns!) But we did deploy mobile phone masts inside them. BT was the first in the world to be able to transmit both 2G and 3G for 4 suppliers all out of one small aerial."

"Unfortunately it was decided from on high that the project wasn't providing enough return so it was cancelled, and so ended what was for me a highly stressful job but a role that I did love a great deal, and I could bore others with details about lighting columns!"

"Any columns that came out and could be re-used (like the one in Westgate street) were re-sited by the council. It was great amusement to be able to spot where they had gone e.g. Westgate Street turned up around the corner in Park Street."

"One very windy day while we were there the council lost 25 lamp posts - all concrete ones that had failed."

Bob

working street: cardiff This is where we only modified the bracket arm. The arm was by Urbis. We installed a long antenna lead down the entire column and put our equipment in a small cabinet to the side (you can just see it in the shadow). The luminaire was an Urbis Albany with tear drop bowl.

westgate street : cardiff We used a new Urbis column that was modified to take our equipment and then changed over the luminaire that was already there. We always seems to be able to get shots with seagulls on the light!

bute terrace: cardiff This was a Stainton 10M columm with a 1m ribble arm. It replaced a 10M concrete column (I think it was a Stanton one)

castle street: cardiff We replaced a 12M Stainton column with one that matched the others in the street. The luminaire was a Saturn 700 with Victorian embellishments. The contractors also forgot to put on the Chatsworth 'embellishments'.

north road: cardiff This was a 12m Stainton column with a 1m Ribble arm. You can see the sort of lamp we replaced behind it, again a concrete one.

toys are us: cardiff This was a 12m replacement again with the councils standard column for in the city which is an Urbis. The rest that we installed were basic variations of these ones. At all times we had to follow what the council wanted, plus keep spares.

"This is a copy of a local newspaper article from 1995. When Braintree had a new installation of DW Windsor Strand lights in the town centre in 1995, a new CCTV system made by Rediffusion was installed, using Strand canopies with a camera hidden inside a black hemispherical bowl. Other designs of "lamp cam" were produced soon after; Witham had a set of these. I have not seen any other CCTV installations quite like the Braintree ones."

"Although quite a good view was obtained from the cameras with the original black bowls, these were later replaced with clear bowls (hemispherical, not teardrop). The cameras are now more compact spherical units on the original brackets."

"I don't remember them, but from looking at old pictures I see Braintree had the GEC Z2-80s in the town centre. I have seen a couple of these monsters mounted on a double headed bracket near a fishing shop in Portway, Worcestershire. Presumably secondhand."

Sue Burden