The County of Los Angeles will fund a major portion of a project designed to improve pedestrian safety through enhanced street lighting in parts of downtown Long Beach, Supervisor Don Knabe announced recently.

The street lighting replacement project will occur on both Broadway and 3rd Street between Pacific Avenue and Long Beach Boulevard. The existing City-owned high pressure sodium lights will be replaced with brighter metal halide lights. The total project cost is $41,000, of which $25,000 will be financed by the County’s Fourth Supervisorial District Public Ways/Public Utilities Fund.

These upgrades will be the second phase of upgrades to street lighting in the downtown area. Local business owners and the Downtown Long Beach Associated worked with the City of Long Beach to make similar upgrades to street lights along Pine Avenue in February 2007.

The goal of this project is to improve lighting and pedestrian safety along the east and west access routes to the nearby Blue Line stations, said Supervisor Knabe. It is a project the County is happy to be a part of.