The city's response is more lights. I'm not sure that will help that much. If people driving down Cherry Street on a busy Saturday night aren't already going slow and getting ready to stop, they're doing it wrong.
Street lights only really improve safety when they produce little or no glare. Glare will keep you from seeing that kid or little old lady step out in front of you.
The solution isnt to add more glare, and yet that is exactly what some people end up proposing.
How about shielding some of that glare instead?
That means no more in-your-face "acorn-style" lights that throw light horizontally at eye-level. There are plenty of shielded choices that look just as nice in the daytime, but dont blind you at night. Also, replace the opened-bottomed NEMA "farm lights" with low-glare, shielded "Full-Cutoff" fixtures that light the same amount of street for half the electricity (which, BTW, is a good way to pay them off).
Don't get me wrong; LED streetlights have great potential, but only if we get the color and optical performance right. It's just that everything Im hearing from the Mayors and TPD's spokespeople is practically right out of the Phillips sales brochure, and not truly informed study.
Cherry Street could benefit from some serious traffic calming (and I dont mean speed bumps) that would be more effective than ruining the character and ambiance of the neighborhood with prison-yard lighting.
Stop using blinding junk like this:
And consider something like this: