Let there be lights! Beachwood considers innovative plan to light up the night

BEACHWOOD, Ohio (WOIO) - It could be an innovative solution to a long-time problem.

“The majority of our city, I believe, does want there to be more lighting and to have our sidewalks and streets to be more well-lit. It’s obviously a safety issue,” said Councilman-at-Large Eric Synenberg. “Nobody wants totally dark, pitch-black streets.

“Streetlights have been talked about for years,” said Councilwoman Danielle Shoykhet, who’s campaigning for her council seat this fall. “I’m hearing from the residents as I’m walking out there that the streetlights are important to them.”

Synenberg estimates a cost of $15 million to put up streetlights on all the city’s residential streets, a five-year project. It would include wires and poles strung throughout all the neighborhoods or digging up lawns and streets to put in underground wires.

Councilpersons Synenberg and Shoykhet are backing a new plan to light up the night.

“If you want to help us as a city become more well-lit, more safe, then you’ll partner with us and put up a lamppost,” Synenberg said about residents putting up a light at the end of their lawn. “Five, six feet from the sidewalk, probably six feet tall.”

Synenberg and Shoykhet want to give the 2800 Beachwood households $1000 or $2000 to put up their own lights on their lawn, far cheaper than the $15 million proposed for traditional street lights.

The plan makes sure people walking at night are safe but not focusing on the streets since cars have headlights to illuminate the roads as they drive.

“We would have lampposts really lighting up the sidewalks which I think may actually be the greater need here,” said Shoykhet.

The plan also provides for a certain amount of self-expression.

“I think there’s that movie ‘Edward Scissorhands’ where every house on that street is the exact same and there’s developments like that,” said Synenberg. “We don’t want that. We don’t want total uniformity but maybe we come up with three or four different options.”

Council needs to draft an ordinance and then pass the plan. A pilot program could start, at the earliest, sometime next year.

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