A street light hangs over a path

Street Lights

Report a Surrey street light outage or learn about our LED street light replacement program.

Street lights are a significant part of Surrey’s infrastructure – with more than 31,500 city-owned street lights on metal poles and more than 6,000 streetlights on wooden poles leased from BC Hydro.

Street lights also help keep Surrey’s roadways and pathways safe, enhance the accessibility and comfort of our public spaces, and contribute to the character of our neighbourhoods.

Report a street light problem

If you see a street light that is not working, report it using our online Report a Problem Service or call 604-591-4338. Include:

  • the street light's location;
  • the pole number (located on the pole about 2 metres from the ground); and
  • the type of pole: wood, metal or concrete.

Report a Street Light Problem

If you see anyone stealing wires from City property, contact the RCMP immediately at 9-1-1.

LED street light replacement 

According to The Climate Group, 19% of the world’s energy is consumed by street lights. Using the latest technology available, Surrey is lightening up our energy consumption.

We will eventually replace our entire inventory of HPS street lights with energy-efficient, smart LEDs. We are focusing our efforts on upgrading locations where there are higher conflicts between vehicles and vulnerable road users such as at traffic signals and pedestrian activated crosswalks. This move will save about $1 million in annual costs and reduce energy consumption by up to 30%.

Check out our LED Street Light Upgrade Dashboard to see our progress.

launch led Street Light Upgrade Dashboard

Benefits of LED street lights

LED street lights benefit Surrey in many ways:

  • Lower cost
  • Longer life
  • Less energy use
  • Reduced waste
  • Better safety
  • Brighter, more natural light

Future benefits of LEDs

Each new LED light is being installed with enabling technology offering future smart benefits. Smart how? Smart because they’ll be part of the City’s intelligent transportation system (ITS) backbone and form a digital network that ties all the lights together.

Capable of communicating with other smart devices, LED street lights will offer opportunities across a variety of applications including traffic management, smart parking, remote control dimming, environmental monitoring and, extending WiFi and cellular communications.

Watch our interview with Metro Vancouver for more information on why we are making the switch to LED street lights.

Where new street lights are installed

The City installs street lights in areas of new development and on newly built walkways. Within a defined Neighbourhood Concept Plan (NCP) area, developers must also put in special ornamental street lighting. Outside of an NCP area, developers install standard metal and silver ornamental street lights.

On rural roads, the City installs street lights at intersections only. Along the public right-of-way, BC Hydro may install additional lights on their wooden poles. Streetlights are not installed in back lanes and limited funds are available for existing walkways.

Reducing street light brightness

Surrey’s street lights use flat glass fixtures and directional LEDs to focus the light intensity where it needs to be on the road. We also use LED lights with a warmer colour temperature of 3000K on local roads (comparable to warm, white household lights), so the lights are not as white as the 4000K lights (the same colour of light emitted by the moon on a clear night) on arterial and collector roads. 

Read our colour temperature review of LED fixtures for more information. 

House-side shields

A property owner may pay to have the City install a house-side shield to reduce street light brightness. We don't install shields on street lights along arterial roads, or on street lights that are required for specific traffic safety issues. To request a quote to install a house-side shield, send us a service request.s

Requesting to have a street light moved

Street light poles must be 1 metre away from a driveway. If a driveway is too close to a street pole, the property owner is responsible for the costs to realign or narrow their driveway, or to relocate a street light.

To request a street light relocation, send us a service request and we will reply with a cost estimate. To realign or narrow your driveway, you need a driveway permit.

Contact

For more information on Surrey street lights, contact the Traffic Management section at EngWebmail@surrey.ca or 604-591-4338.​​​