219I. Plantation Avenue / Plantation Grove / Swinate Road / Black Dyke Road, Arnside, South Lakeland, Cumbria With thanks to Dwight for informing me of these Survivors. Installed on these roads are a variety of 15 ft / 5 m columns, with the majority of these accommodating Thorn Beta 7 lanterns, although two support Beta 4s instead. Curiously, the Beta 7s are fitted to Estate Minor columns (with 15 degree side-entry brackets) made by Concrete Utilities (save for one sheet steel replacement), while the Beta 4s are installed on Stanton 10 columns with 'F'-type brackets. All lanterns still appear to run 80 Watt MBF (mercury vapour) lamps.
This 10F / Beta 4 combination is at the junction of Plantation Avenue and Swinate Road.
As with my own Beta 4, this example features a polycarbonate refractor bowl. The detector for a Zodion SS55 two-part photocell is visible on the canopy.
One of the two columns on the short cul-de-sac Plantation Grove retains its Beta 7.
These all feature glass refractor bowls, with an unknown object being visible within this example.
The bowls have a symmetrical appearance when viewed from beneath.
Through the early morning September mist, the first example on Plantation Avenue comes into view.
The detector for a Royce Thompson P42 photocell is prominent on the Beta 7's canopy. The mist has caused moisture to form on the outside of the bowl, and allowed a cobweb attached to the rear of the lantern to become visible.
Ascending the hill a little further, another example was to be seen.
Not only has this example's bowl clip lost its ability to secure the front of the bowl to the canopy; lengths of insulation tape have been applied to one side of the bowl - presumably, as an anti-glare measure for an adjacent property.
This column is located on the inside of the bend at the top of the hill.
Fortunately, this bowl is still in as-original condition (save for the accumulated dirt on the inside, of course).
The sun was trying to burn through by the time that this picture was taken; the prismatic bowl refractors diffusing the rays accordingly.
One column had been replaced with this sheet steel column, though a Beta 7 was still fitted.
I am not certain of when Concrete Utilities replaced the Estate Minor column design with the Estate Minor X, but if the Beta 7s are original to them, they could be some of the last to be produced to this older design. The Beta 7 fitted to this column may have been fitted to the previous column here, and then swapped over to the new column when replacement occurred.
The column base contains a Philips-branded ballast and capacitor for an 80 Watt MBF lamp - these components look to be from the 1980s, and are probably original to when the column was installed. Beneath that, a relay for an SS55 photocell, installed in October 2000, provides the automatic switching.
Another Beta 4 was to be found at the junction of Black Dyke Road and Swinate Road.
The installation looks especially unloved, with the column showing a sizeable vertical crack heading down its shaft, concrete missing from the rear of the bracket, and the lantern being lit during the day. The MBF lamp was quite dim, and so it had probably been in this state for a while. Notice that this example uses a different bowl design, with transparent sections that allow the lamp to be glimpsed within it.
Another sheet steel column supporting a Beta 7 was situated a little further along Black Dyke Road.
This too uses a different type of bowl - I believe that this plastic version was mooted as being an anti-vandal alternative to the more fragile glass.
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