Lighting design adapted to the constant changes of the city
Budolfi Plads in Aalborg leads the way for future urban planning.
Light Bureau designs lighting solutions for more sustainable, attractive, and inclusive cities. This requires lighting design with an understanding of the diverse patterns of how people use the city throughout the day. That way, it’s ensured that the lighting design is adaptable to the constantly changing city.
Adapted lighting
At Budolfi Plads in Aalborg the lighting is adaptive to the natural lights of the day and the changes in user patterns and activities of the city. The adaptive lighting improves the orientation of the space, creates a sense of safety, while creating a distinctive lighting experience for users of the city square.
The lighting on Budolfi Plads is designed from a holistic perspective, that ensures a strong synergy between people, landscape, architecture, and lighting. By doing that we can create sustainable lighting design.
Light Bureau – part of AFRY has designed and projected the new lighting for Budolfi Plads, which is located near the Budolfi Church in an area with roots dating back to medieval Aalborg. The square has gone through an extensive transformation from parking space to a welcoming and green urban space for the residents and visitors of the city. Today the square is joining the city’s network of distinctive urban spaces and central meeting spots, as part of Aalborg’s characteristic lighting profile.
The lighting project was based on an analysis of the square, mapping the primary and secondary access routes and routes of movements over the span of a day and a year.
”Lighting in future cities should be created from a more adaptive and holistic perspective, that makes it possible to support the constant changes of our surroundings. The trick is to find the best balance between diversity and a fixed framework, which enables us to react to changes without losing sight of the spirit of the space. With the current technology and our professional approach, we can transform and enhance the visual environment of our cities”, says Franziska Holmsted, who is Project Manager & Senior Lighting Designer at Light Bureau – part of AFRY.
Adaptive lighting and preprogramed lighting scenarios
The lighting on Budolfi Plads is adaptive, which means that the composition of the lighting adapts to the natural daylight throughout the year while creating the best possible lighting environments for users in the dark hours. The adaptive lighting controls reacts to the varying needs and usage patterns of the users throughout the day and over the year. The light controls can be adapted to new usage patterns and activities of the future, such as the lighting aesthetic, energy optimisation, and making the lighting flexible for different functionalities.
Preprogramed lighting scenarios consider the changing seasons, the buildings nearby, and the changing functionality of the space from traffic to residential space. The work is generally done within four different time periods for the lighting scenarios throughout the day. For instance, the functional lighting will be focused on the primary walking paths in the period from 11:00 pm to 05:00 am, since the square is mainly used as a transition point at night-time. This is done with the purpose of securing peace at night for the adjacent homes, but still maintaining a safe passage across the square.
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