21FAA. Meadowside Drive, Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire Installed on a footpath adjacent the Town's library is a Thorn QC4 'Classic' square-based 5 m aluminium column supporting a post-top Precinct lantern. A useful feature of the Precinct is that it was available in wall-mounted and post-top forms, with the post-top adaptor being suitable for accommodating up to two separate lanterns, adding considerable versatility to the design. In the mid-2000s, there were several identical installations along the same footpath, and these were still extant in 2017, but by 2022, the remainder had been replaced in their entirety, leaving this sole example in place. These installations are likely to date from around 1976, when the library opened as a replacement for the previous 1879 building on Union Street, on land occupied formerly by Bass Maltings.
The Classic column plays second fiddle to the landmark Grade II-listed 1866 water tower; the only surviving remnant of the Bass site.
Much of the Precinct's polycarbonate bowl is missing, exposing the lamp within the fitting.
Had a second lantern been fitted, it would attach to the post-top adaptor using the same fixing screw positions that are used to secure the blanking plate.
The join between the fitting and the adaptor is obvious in this view.
The missing bowl allows the internal label to be seen. This confirms that this Precinct was made in week 22 of 2005 (30th May - 5th June), and will have been a direct replacement for the original fitting. Surprisingly, the label also states that it is intended to run a single 80 Watt mercury vapour (MBF) lamp - I would have thought that a high pressure sodium (SON) version would have been selected when a new fitting was required here, but perhaps the original was also 80 W MBF, and so the replacement was ordered to match. This would make sense, as low wattage SON lamps were only just beginning to be produced in the mid-1970s, and wouldn't become more prevalent until the following decade.
The column's inspection door is missing, allowing the modern Lucy cut-out to be seen within. Along with the two supply cables that are terminated into the cut-out using jubilee clips (yuck), a third, disconnected, cable is also visible.
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