Amey (Walsall) works has worked in partnership with Walsall Council since 2002 with the purpose of improving and maintaining the street lighting stock and standardising the lighting throughout Walsall. Amey has greatly improved the night-time environment in one of the first street lighting Private Finance Initiatives (PFI) in the UK, involving the replacement and maintenance of 25,000 lighting columns across the region.

Walsall is a diverse metropolitan borough with great cultural heritage, including rural villages, market towns, and commercial centres. Its street lighting network suffered from many years of under-investment and maintenance backlog. The introduction of the UK Government’s PFI to Local Government in the late 1990s provided an opportunity for the authority to obtain the necessary investment and expertise to transform the network.

The first phase of the project brought all streetlights in Walsall up to international standards, a process that was completed 2 years ahead of the scheduled programme having replaced over 18,000 streetlights. This has greatly reduced the disruption caused to local residents and businesses during the process.

The following successes have been achieved so far in Walsall since this project began:

• Reductions in road traffic accidents of up to 22% across the region
• A 24% fall in the number of night time burglaries and thefts since the start of the programme
• Sustainability has always been high on the agenda in this project and as such Walsall is now one of the top users of green electricity in the UK which promotes vast cost savings. The cost savings for the Council from green electricity are up to £60,000 per year, because green energy is exempt from climate change levy.
• Helping the Council’s CPA rating improve from weak in 2002 to good (three stars) in 2005 leading to the Council being highly commended in the Most Improved Council of the Year award at the LGC awards in 2006.