Teddington Lock is used by several thousand pedestrians and cyclists every single day to cross the River Thames. It provides a direct link between Ham and Teddington.

DW Windsor Lighting was approached by the London Borough of Richmond to improve the poor quality lighting on the footbridges, which was coming to the end of its serviceable life. In addition to existing illumination levels being poor, much light was being shed on the river below to the detriment of the local bats and other wildlife.

This challenging brief included the need to gain Listed Building and Environment Agency consent, a long maintenance-free design life, a reduction in energy and the achievement of good lighting levels (S5) on the bridge without illuminating the waterway. DW Windsor’s Garda LED illuminated handrail was the obvious choice to provide the performance and uniformity needed.

Following removal of the existing 2 sided rail which widened the cyclist route, DW Windsor’s bespoke low-level lighting solution Garda, was installed, featuring 78 x 300mm Asymmetric LED modules (dimmed to 25% output). Bespoke brackets were designed to be sympathetic to the listed structure and surroundings.

The busy suspension bridge in Teddington remained open over peak periods, including weekends, only closing between the hours of 9.30am and 3.30pm - Monday to Fridays to allow schoolchildren and commuters to continue to cross the river. This was a particularly important consideration to the local community as many cyclists use the route to continue their longer commute towards central London (with the next nearest footbridge over 1.5 miles away).

Andrew Porter, Principal Lighting Engineer at Richmond commented, “the main challenge was how to reduce the amount of light pollution onto the river, so as not to upset the ecology for local bats, birds and water life whilst achieving good lighting levels and uniformity for the highly used pedestrian and cyclist bridge. With the previous scheme scattering light onto the adjacent water, we (LB Richmond) trusted in the expertise of DW Windsor, who have previous project experience and dealings with the Bat Conservation Trust, to design a solution that focussed the light onto the deck of the bridge where required and uniformly light the full length of the bridge, eliminating dark patches.”

The resulting scheme has been extremely well received and has resulted in a substantial energy saving of 72%.