Stair Lighting

The lighting in common stairs always used to be considered part of the street lighting, but recent cost cutting measures by the City of Edinburgh Council mean that is no longer true. Instead, householders in privately owned stairs will be expected to meet the costs of maintaining the lights themselves.

No longer can you rely on the Council to replace faulty bulbs. Private contractors will have to be employed to do the work. If residents on a stair don't agree this could lead to dangerous situations where stairs are unlit, with the potential for accidents and crime.

The Community Council has been looking into the problem and would like to offer advice, but it is not easy to do that as the situation can be complex. What we would say is that residents on a stair should come to an agreement as to how they are going to manage stair lighting issues, and find a contractor who can convert the lighting to LED type. In most cases the existing luminaires can be adapted to take LEDs, and once converted the running and maintenance costs will be much lower as LED lights use less electricity to produce the same amount of light, and have a much longer working life.