The effects of leaked lights from shops on the feeling of easiness in the nighttime shopping street

Abstract

The visual environment in a nighttime shopping street is composed of various lighting elements, for example, street light, signboard light and window displayed light etc. Generally, the lighting appearance in a shopping street changes rapidly on the boundary of 20 PM, because almost attached lighting equipments are turned off at the time of shop's closing. In these lighting equipments, especially signboard light and leaked light from a shop are usually related to human activities, so it is expected that the lighting equipments bring not only brightness but also easiness to pedestrians in the street. This research examined the function of lighting equipments attached to shops, and searched for their effectively usages after shop closing. At first, the experiment was carried out which subjects evaluated the lighting environment before and after shops' closing. The result indicated that the subjects felt uneasiness and no surveillance in the lighting environment after shops' closing. In addition, it was indicated that the feelings of surveillance were associated with the leaked lights from shops. So next, the experiment was carried out to clarify effects of the leaked lights from shops. Variables adopted in the experiment were the amount of leaked light and facade transparency of shops. As a result, it was cleared that the feelings of human presence and feelings of uneasiness were associated with not only the amount of the leaked light but also the facade formation of the shop.