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  #13261  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 1:35 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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^Probably just repairs. Chicago's façade ordinance is pretty tough on masonry buildings after some spectacular delaminations in the 90s.
Yeah, looks like a tuckpointing set up to me. They have anchored the scaffolds to the walls which would make it might difficult to do any demolition or replacement of what is there already. Chip away at the existing facade on a setup like that and you'll end up plunging to your death once the scaffold comes loose and falls down. Looks to me like they are putting it up to complete repairs to what is already there as you said.
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  #13262  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 2:31 PM
orulz orulz is offline
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http://www.suntimes.com/6899981-417/...hite-glow.html

City switching to street lamps that cast a white glow
BY DARRYL HOLLIDAY Staff Reporter
August 5, 2011

The yellow-orange street lamp glow Chicagoans have become accustomed to over the years is going the way of the "pretty blue lights" of Lake Shore Drive once commemorated in song.

The blue lights along Lake Shore Drive - mercury-vapor streetlamps used into the '70s - gave way to the yellow-orange lights currently used in most of the city, sodium-vapor street lamps. This week, however, the Chicago Department of Transportation announced it is installing new, energy efficient lighting on street lamps and traffic signals, which casts a white glow on city streets.

The new, metal-halide lights will use less energy than the current streetlamps. Chicago, according to CDOT officials, is the first large U.S. city to install the relatively new technology en masse. City officials estimate an annual $1.8 million in electrical cost savings ...
Why are they committing to metal halide lights now when LED lights are pretty much already the clearly better choice?

I'm pretty sure metal halide lights contain quite a bit of mercury. They also use twice as much energy per lumen of output, and also don't last nearly as long as LEDs. The only problem with LEDs at the moment is their cost, but that is dropping rapidly. Put off this switch for another couple years and LED lights would be an even more clear winner.

I guess the only thing is if the metal halide bulbs can be just inserted into the existing fixtures without new lenses or ballasts or antyhing, then the metal halide switch will be LOTS LOTS cheaper, since LEDs require new fixtures.

The reason metal halide bulbs are "more efficient" than sodium is not because they omit quantitatively more light per watt, it's that the quality of the light is so much better that they don't need to be nearly as bright in order to achieve the same perception of illumination.
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  #13263  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 2:41 PM
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A few of the rear construction from 6-5



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  #13264  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 3:20 PM
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Why are they committing to metal halide lights now when LED lights are pretty much already the clearly better choice?
They're actually Ceramic Metal Halide, a somewhat different animal
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  #13265  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 5:28 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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Isn't one of the advantages of LED's that they can be adapted to fit just about any fixture? So wouldn't it be possible to just easily switch them out again in 5 or 10 years when it becomes cost effective to do so?

I am installing them in some can lights right now and they are expensive ($40 per light), but just screw in with a normal socket and are supposed to last 30 years...
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  #13266  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 7:12 PM
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The reason metal halide bulbs are "more efficient" than sodium is not because they omit quantitatively more light per watt, it's that the quality of the light is so much better that they don't need to be nearly as bright in order to achieve the same perception of illumination.
Isn't the color rendition of metal halide far superior to that of LED?

I believe LED also needs a complex reflector to produce an even pattern of light instead of one that is marbled with the glow of each diode.

Personally, I have a strong nostalgia for the sodium-vapor orange glow, but I appreciate that the city is taking steps to be more environmentally-friendly.
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  #13267  
Old Posted Aug 10, 2011, 7:33 PM
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Luminosity is probably a significant issue as well. Depending on required output for exterior lighting, LED might not be able to provide necessary luminosity, or it might be cost-prohibitive to use LED for such a large-scale implementation. For projects I'm currently working on that are using LED can fixtures, ROI is still about 2 years even though the they'll last for 5-8 years (per manufacturers' spec.); but these are for single, 25W output that are used as wall-washers (interior & exterior applications).
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  #13268  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 1:55 AM
Rizzo Rizzo is offline
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Originally Posted by ardecila View Post
Isn't the color rendition of metal halide far superior to that of LED?

I believe LED also needs a complex reflector to produce an even pattern of light instead of one that is marbled with the glow of each diode.

Personally, I have a strong nostalgia for the sodium-vapor orange glow, but I appreciate that the city is taking steps to be more environmentally-friendly.
Eh I like the brighter alleys, and the LEDs have a warm glow unlike the purplish glow the old ones had.
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  #13269  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 2:34 AM
emathias emathias is offline
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Huron/Clark

Anyone know why the surface lot on the NW corner of Huron/Clark is empty lately? It was being used by the Felix Hotel (formerly the Wacker Hotel) but now it has piped outlining it, and bright chains blocking the entrances/exits.
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  #13270  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 4:48 AM
denizen467 denizen467 is offline
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^^ I'm not sure, but it might be the case that LEDs use DC and consume low voltage. (I'm guessing that the screw-in LED bulbs starting to become available for standard domestic bulb sockets actually have AC adapters built into each bulb -- one thing that would keep them expensive and, if you've held one, very surprisingly heavy.) I presume all the city light poles have AC 120V (or 240V?) running in them. So, as Orulz mentioned above, you would need different fixtures for LEDs. Of course, you theoretically could actually reuse the existing fixtures and have each new LED bulb include all of the necessary conversion stuff, but in the long run it might be better to have low-voltage DC light poles/fixtures and simpler, cheaper LED bulbs.

People above have mentioned how the quality of LED light is different -- I wonder if that means they needed to replace the fixtures' transparent covers too?
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  #13271  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 7:45 AM
lawfin lawfin is offline
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Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280 View Post
Isn't one of the advantages of LED's that they can be adapted to fit just about any fixture? So wouldn't it be possible to just easily switch them out again in 5 or 10 years when it becomes cost effective to do so?

I am installing them in some can lights right now and they are expensive ($40 per light), but just screw in with a normal socket and are supposed to last 30 years...
Good luck with that. Hopefully they have advanced in the last 18 months or so because in spring 0f 2010 after gutting my house we attempted to initially use LED lights; they were expensive but effectively would last forever (indefinitely) however they were not compatible with the Lumex dimmers we used. They would flicker or not turn on and then jump to on once dimmer reached a certain threshold.

Hope you have better luck......the lighting was kind of neat if a little harsh versus incandescent
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  #13272  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 2:57 PM
orulz orulz is offline
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Originally Posted by ardecila View Post
Isn't the color rendition of metal halide far superior to that of LED?[

I believe LED also needs a complex reflector to produce an even pattern of light instead of one that is marbled with the glow of each diode.

Personally, I have a strong nostalgia for the sodium-vapor orange glow, but I appreciate that the city is taking steps to be more environmentally-friendly.
Not entirely sure of the color rendition. A quick check on the Wikipedia page pegs CMH at a CRI of 96 (100 is max, and is the rating of incandescent and sunlight) so its color rendition is indeed pretty awesome. LED is generally about 80, but qualitatively, since LEDs are frequently used for indoor lighting, I'm pretty sure that their color rendition must be more than sufficient. Fluorescent lights can range from a CRI of 51 to 89, for example.

You want to talk about terrible color rendition, low pressure sodium lights have a CRI of 5 and high pressure sodium are about 25.

Most LED streetlights that I have seen include no reflector or refractor whatsoever; the individual LEDs are usually fitted with lenses that refract their light and spread it out over a wide area.

The big win with LED is its durability and energy usage which drives down costs significantly, but that all goes out the window if CMH is a simple "screw-in" replacement, in contrast with the complete replacement of everything except the pole (and perhaps even the pole itself) that LED would require. LEDs probably only make sense as new installations, or where the entire fixture must be replaced, or where the poles are being taken down anyway on account of road work or streetscaping.

Last edited by orulz; Aug 11, 2011 at 3:11 PM.
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  #13273  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2011, 4:02 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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Good luck with that. Hopefully they have advanced in the last 18 months or so because in spring 0f 2010 after gutting my house we attempted to initially use LED lights; they were expensive but effectively would last forever (indefinitely) however they were not compatible with the Lumex dimmers we used. They would flicker or not turn on and then jump to on once dimmer reached a certain threshold.

Hope you have better luck......the lighting was kind of neat if a little harsh versus incandescent
Yeah, this is a part of a gut rehab project I've been working on and I pulled all the old electrical and have completely replaced it with all switches and dimmers compatible with LED's. Also, the new LED lights have some sort of filter that knocks down the harshness of them a bit. They look almost like sunlight. It's like daytime in there when I have all six of them at full blast.
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  #13274  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 2:30 AM
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Looks like they've already started work on the Esquire Theater redevelopment
-edit-

Last edited by spyguy; Oct 10, 2011 at 2:12 AM.
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  #13275  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 4:04 AM
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Columbia College is working on an interesting refacing project with Gensler for 618 S. Michigan, the old Spertus Institute building.  The building was originally built in 1913 as the Arcade Building, but was refaced by IBM in 1958. The new curtain wall would be a contemporary glass system, but with a frit that suggests an image of the original façade. There are a lot of details to be worked out yet about the image, but Landmarks staff is pretty much on board.



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  #13276  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 4:33 AM
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Am I reading that shadow line right? It looks as if the ground floor angles back from the property line. Either that, or the curtain wall itself is angled. I'm a bit disappointed by the ground floor, honestly. Columbia's spending a ton of money on a slick new curtain-wall system to evoke the 1913 facade, but the street frontage remains pretty boring and average. I'd like to see Gensler address that.

Regardless, it's a neat concept. There's been a small but promising trend of Chicago architects using fritted glass in new, innovative ways.

It reminds me of 4240's plan for the former Bond Store on State... letting a modern butt-glazed curtain wall evoke the original stone panels, while giving the glass some opacity to make it more closely resemble stone. (The Sol LeWitt-inspired frit pattern on Bond is genius...)
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  #13277  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 4:58 AM
ChiTownCity ChiTownCity is offline
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One thing I really hate about that plan is the fact that it sits right next to the spertus building. so far I've never been impressed with two glass buildings being right next to each other. The contrast between the spertus building and its neighbors made it stand out just that much more. Now with another glass facade adjacent to it, it's just not going to look as impressive in my opinion.....
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  #13278  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 5:35 AM
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Yeah, I really like the idea, but the two glass buildings compete. I would have loved to see something different. But an improvement regardless. I hope they'll make use of some potentially good lighting opportunities.
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  #13279  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 11:24 AM
denizen467 denizen467 is offline
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He's baaaaack...

http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.co...ange-joins-voa
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Architect Lucien Lagrange joins VOA
By: Eddie Baeb August 08, 2011

(Crain's) - Well-known Chicago architect Lucien Lagrange has joined VOA Associates Inc., about a year after Mr. Lagrange's firm filed for bankruptcy protection.

Mr. Lagrange will be the lead designer in VOA's luxury residential, hospitality and commercial mixed-use business, according to a statement Monday from the Chicago-based firm.

...
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  #13280  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2011, 2:00 PM
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Originally Posted by ChiTownCity View Post
One thing I really hate about that plan is the fact that it sits right next to the spertus building. so far I've never been impressed with two glass buildings being right next to each other. The contrast between the spertus building and its neighbors made it stand out just that much more. Now with another glass facade adjacent to it, it's just not going to look as impressive in my opinion.....
Isn't that the fault of Spertus? This building has had a glass curtain wall since 1958.
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