You're correct that they're technically blue, but they only start that way. Eventually they get a shitty phosphor coating on top of them to convert most of the energy to white, but they still retain a big ol' blue spike in their output spectra.
What's really sad about this is (as I've written before (http://sparksnotes.info/?p=974)) is that it doesn't have to be this way, it's just that in the rush to save money with the lowest-cost solution right now municipalities are picking, well, the crappy-phosphor-converted LED lights instead of opting for a better coating. Better coatings would likely make people a lot happier and probably help with safety (increased color rendering makes things easier to see) and make the light more aesthetically pleasing. Too bad they're basically locking themselves into terrible light for the next twenty years. Ugh.
I don't disagree with you about streetlights being largely unnecessary in their present form, but I can appreciate having some minimal walking-about light. Maybe it's time to reduce the height of the poles to bring them much closer to road height - no need to have them towering above the roadway on residential streets - and reduce the brightness by an order of magnitude. And improve the phosphor to more closely approximate incandescent or halogen output, which most people prefer.
Blue LEDs
Date: 2016-Aug-10, Wednesday 17:49 (UTC)What's really sad about this is (as I've written before (http://sparksnotes.info/?p=974)) is that it doesn't have to be this way, it's just that in the rush to save money with the lowest-cost solution right now municipalities are picking, well, the crappy-phosphor-converted LED lights instead of opting for a better coating. Better coatings would likely make people a lot happier and probably help with safety (increased color rendering makes things easier to see) and make the light more aesthetically pleasing. Too bad they're basically locking themselves into terrible light for the next twenty years. Ugh.
I don't disagree with you about streetlights being largely unnecessary in their present form, but I can appreciate having some minimal walking-about light. Maybe it's time to reduce the height of the poles to bring them much closer to road height - no need to have them towering above the roadway on residential streets - and reduce the brightness by an order of magnitude. And improve the phosphor to more closely approximate incandescent or halogen output, which most people prefer.