{"id":591497,"date":"2026-04-09T01:53:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T01:53:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/591497\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T01:53:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T01:53:09","slug":"toronto-to-convert-all-streetlights-in-city-to-led-lighting-by-2035-officials-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/591497\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto to convert all streetlights in city to LED lighting by 2035, officials say"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The city of Toronto plans to convert all streetlights to energy-efficient LED lighting by 2035, officials say.<\/p>\n

Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow told reporters in Scarborough’s Milliken Park that the plan is a “major step forward to modernize our street lighting system,” which is decades old and starting to fail.<\/p>\n

Chow said at a news conference Wednesday that the plan, in which the city work with Toronto Hydro, will cost $577 million and will make neighbourhoods safer.<\/p>\n

“We will convert every street light to modern LED light in the next 10 years, more than doubling our current pace. To keep the system going, we will also replace aging infrastructure below ground,” Chow said.<\/p>\n

In a news release Wednesday, the city and utility said the funds for the upgrade are in the city’s 2026 budget and will cover LED conversion, critical underground infrastructure renewal and smart lighting controls over 10 years.<\/p>\n

Chow said the city has been relying on “expensive temporary fixes and emergency repair” under an agreement with Toronto Hydro that has been in place for 25 years. In 2025, the utility said it had more than 25,000 service calls for streetlight outages and emergency repairs. <\/p>\n

“Instead of upgrading a street light when we know it’s nearing the end of its life, we wait for it to go out. Then we wait for our residents to notice it and then call 311. Then we go and pay to send someone out to fix it,” Chow said. <\/p>\n

“That approach is no longer good enough. We are moving from reactive to proactive, planning ahead, investing in a long-term solution.” <\/p>\n

LED lighting means ‘safer, brighter streets,’ mayor says<\/p>\n

Toronto Hydro said 33 per cent of street lighting assets and 86 per cent of underground infrastructure are past their useful life.<\/p>\n

“This is just not a number we can ignore,” said Chow, adding the LED lighting will mean “safer, brighter streets for pedestrians, cyclists and drivers, and fewer outages.”<\/p>\n

\"TorontoTwo streetlights in downtown Toronto are shown here. The city has 173,000 luminaires, more than 60,000 poles and 2,500 kilometres of overhead and underground cables. (Robert Krbavac\/CBC)<\/p>\n

Chow said the city will prioritize neighbourhoods with the greatest infrastructure needs and highest safety risk. The city and Toronto Hydro have worked together to determine which areas will get upgrades first.<\/p>\n

Jana Mosley, president and CEO of Toronto Hydro, said the funds will be “front-loaded” over the first four years to accelerate conversion to LED lighting. That means, by the fifth year, Toronto Hydro expects that 60 per cent of the streetlights will be converted to LED.<\/p>\n

“This is a much-needed investment that not only marks a major infrastructure transformation for Toronto, but also a technological transformation,” she said. <\/p>\n

“LED lighting is the global standard. LEDs last two to four times longer than conventional lights,” she said.<\/p>\n

“LED conversion enables implementation of smart lighting controls, which will allow for immediate alerts when lights go out, as well as scheduling and dimming strategies,” she added. <\/p>\n

Toronto has 173,000 luminaires, more than 60,000 poles and 2,500 kilometres of overhead and underground cables.<\/p>\n

According to Mosley, LED street lights reduce energy consumption by 40 per cent to 60 per cent.<\/p>\n

The upgrade will mean fewer failures and lower maintenance costs, she said, adding the city could save more than $6 million a year in energy costs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 3 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194291],"tags":[49,48,3302],"class_list":["post-591497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}