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In the United Kingdom, lighting-up time is a legally-enforced period from half an hour after sunset to half an hour before sunrise, during which all motor vehicles on unlit public roads (except if parked) must use their headlights.
Lighting-up time was first introduced in the nineteenth century in local by-laws and enforced nationally by the Lights on Vehicles Act 1907. In the 1920s, service stations started displaying cardboard clock-face displays, set to the lighting-up time for the day. The Road Lighting Act 1942 stipulated 1 hour after sunset/before sunrise. It was amended to 30 minutes by the Road Traffic Act 1956 because of the increasing speed of traffic. These were the required times for showing all lights on all vehicles, including bicycles and horse-drawn carts, hence the name lighting-up time.
The current Road Vehicles Lighting Regulations 1989 tightened the requirements further. Lighting-up time is retained as the required period for use of motor vehicle headlights on roads without lit streetlights, but with that exception, all vehicles must now keep conspicuity lights lit during the longer period of sunset to sunrise (unless parked, in a designated parking place and facing the same way as adjacent traffic and more than 10 metres (33 ft) from the nearest junction on a road with a speed limit not exceeding 30 miles per hour (48 km/h) Note: This exemption only applies for "a motor vehicle being a goods vehicle the unladen weight of which does not exceed 1525 kg;" [1] ). The conspicuity lights required are "front and rear position lamps" (side and tail lights) plus, for large vehicles, side marker lamps and end-outline marker lamps and, for motor vehicles, rear number plate lights.
Different rules apply to bicycles; RVLR states that "Lights (and reflectors) are required on a pedal cycle only between sunset and sunrise. Lights (and reflectors) are not required when the cycle is stationary or being pushed along the roadside. When they are required, the lights and reflectors listed below must be clean and working properly."[ citation needed ]
Headlights are also required at other times when visibility is restricted, e.g. by fog, rain, snow, overcast sky or smoke. They should also be used in tunnels.
Streetlights are usually set to come on automatically near the beginning of lighting-up time, although modern lamps monitor the light level and turn on when this gets too low, and so are influenced by weather. They may also be set to switch off automatically when road usage is reduced, often at midnight, although currently most stay on until about the end of lighting-up time.
Sunrise and sunset are defined by the Road Vehicles Lighting Regulations as local sunrise and sunset so the times are different in different parts of the UK; they are earlier in the east and later in the west, and vary more with the seasons in northerly locations than in southerly locations.
Lighting-up times were formerly commonly displayed in national and local newspapers in the UK and announced on national and local radio stations, but the widespread adoption of street lighting has rendered this largely redundant. As a result, most of the previous sources no longer provide them, but may still provide sunrise/sunset times.
A headlamp is a lamp attached to the front of a vehicle to illuminate the road ahead. Headlamps are also often called headlights, but in the most precise usage, headlamp is the term for the device itself and headlight is the term for the beam of light produced and distributed by the device.
Twilight is light produced by sunlight scattering in the upper atmosphere, when the Sun is below the horizon, which illuminates the lower atmosphere and the Earth's surface. The word twilight can also refer to the periods of time when this illumination occurs.
A street light, light pole, lamp pole, lamppost, street lamp, light standard, or lamp standard is a raised source of light on the edge of a road or path. Similar lights may be found on a railway platform. When urban electric power distribution became ubiquitous in developed countries in the 20th century, lights for urban streets followed, or sometimes led.
A navigation light, also known as a running or position light, is a source of illumination on a watercraft, aircraft or spacecraft, meant to give information on the craft's position, heading, or status. Some navigation lights are colour-coded red and green to aid traffic control by identifying the craft's orientation. Their placement is mandated by international conventions or civil authorities such as the International Maritime Organization (IMO).
Bicycle lighting is illumination attached to bicycles whose purpose above all is, along with reflectors, to improve the visibility of the bicycle and its rider to other road users under circumstances of poor ambient illumination. A secondary purpose is to illuminate reflective materials such as cat's eyes and traffic signs. A third purpose may be to illuminate the roadway so that the rider can see the way ahead. Serving the latter purposes require much more luminous flux and thus more power.
A daytime running lamp is an automotive lighting and bicycle lighting device on the front of a roadgoing motor vehicle or bicycle, automatically switched on when the vehicle's handbrake has been pulled down, when the vehicle is in gear, or when the engine is started, emitting white, yellow, or amber light. Their intended use is not to help the driver see the road or their surroundings, but to help other road users identify an active vehicle.
A motor vehicle has lighting and signaling devices mounted to or integrated into its front, rear, sides, and, in some cases, top. Various devices have the dual function of illuminating the road ahead for the driver, and making the vehicle visible to others, with indications to them of turning, slowing or stopping, etc., with lights also indicating the size of some large vehicles.
Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 108 regulates all automotive lighting, signalling and reflective devices in the United States. Like all other Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, FMVSS 108 is administered by the United States Department of Transportation's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
In photography, the golden hour is the period of daytime shortly after sunrise or before sunset, during which daylight is redder and softer than when the sun is higher in the sky.
Emergency vehicle lighting, also known as simply emergency lighting or emergency lights, is a type of vehicle lighting used to visually announce a vehicle's presence to other road users. A sub-type of emergency vehicle equipment, emergency vehicle lighting is generally used by emergency vehicles and other authorized vehicles in a variety of colors.
A safety reflector is a retroreflector intended for pedestrians, runners, motorized and non-motorized vehicles. A safety reflector is similar to reflective stripes that can be found on safety vests and clothing worn by road workers and rescue workers. They are sometimes erroneously called luminous badges or luminous tags, but this is incorrect as they do not themselves produce light, but only reflect it.
A wig-wag is a device for flashing an automobile's headlamps, in its simplest form, so only one of the two headlights operates at a time, with the two flashing at a preset rate. In its traditional form a wig-wag emits the right and left headlamps alternately, with each lamp lit for around half a second at a time. In the United Kingdom the wig-wag is only seen on the road on emergency vehicles. The 'standard' wig-wag is often used within a cycle of other illumination patterns, such as swiftly alternating the left and right headlights, alternating the left and right headlights slowly, or flashing both headlights together, and using a mixture of high- and low-/dipped-beams.
Emergency vehicle equipment is any equipment fitted to, or carried by, an emergency vehicle, other than the equipment that a standard non-emergency vehicle is fitted with.
A parabolic aluminized reflector lamp is a type of electric lamp that is widely used in commercial, residential, and transportation illumination. It produces a highly directional beam. Usage includes theatrical lighting, locomotive headlamps, aircraft landing lights, and residential and commercial recessed lights.
Emergency vehicle equipment is used in the United Kingdom to indicate urgent journeys by an emergency service. This usage is colloquially known as "blues and twos", which refers to the blue lights and the two-tone siren once commonplace. A call-out requiring the use of lights and sirens is often colloquially known as a "blue light run".
A motorcycle headlamp modulator is an accessory device that oscillates the intensity of a motorcycle headlamp at 240 ±40 cycles per minute (~4 Hz) between approximately 20% and 100% of full intensity. The headlight operates at full intensity 50-70% of the time. United States and Canadian regulations require headlight modulators to include a light sensor that disables modulation when the ambient light level drops below a certain point. When this happens, the headlamps burn steadily.
Night aviation regulations in the United States are administered and enforced by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Unlike many countries, the United States places no special restrictions on VFR flying at night.
Road traffic control devices are markers, signs and signal devices used to inform, guide and control traffic, including pedestrians, motor vehicle drivers and bicyclists. These devices are usually placed adjacent, over or along the highways, roads, traffic facilities and other public areas that require traffic control.
Trains include a variety of types of lights, for safety, illumination, and communicating train status. The most universal type of light is the headlight, which is included on the front of locomotives, and frequently on the rear as well. Other types of lights include classification lights, which indicate train direction and status, and ditch lights, which are a pair of lights positioned towards the bottom of a train to illuminate the tracks.