The South Tyrolean Ewo redesigns the led lighting of the city of Vienna
The South Tyrolean company from Cortaccia ewo rethinks the lighting of the cosmopolitan city of Vienna. From customized solutions, such as in the historic city center and on the renowned Reichsbrücke bridge, to the new standard luminaire: ewo’s 25 years of experience, innovative thinking and technical knowledge emerge in this project. The public space becomes a living room, light a bonfire, since ewo is synonymous with the transformation of public spaces into places of wellbeing: empowering wellbeing outdoors.
Municipal section 33 (MA33) of the city of Vienna is responsible for the lighting of 2,800 km of streets and pedestrian paths with approximately 158,000 lighting fixtures. In 2016 the new “Master Plan – Light 2016” was decided for the conversion to LED technology. The implementation project for a complete modernization started with a launch event in 2017 and at the latest by the end of 2026 all old luminaires will be converted to LED. This, in detail, is the concept of the MA33 for the conversion to LED: in addition to the rope suspension lamps, the 80,000 luminaires used on the pole will also be replaced by the new “Vienna” lamp equipped with a LED. The ordering and delivery of the new Viennese standard luminaires are logistically optimized in close cooperation with ewo. This means that you only need to order the quantities that can be gradually installed. The progress of the works can be followed on the map of the city of wien.at. In view of the huge number of luminaires in the area of the city of Vienna, the longevity and ease of maintenance of the luminaires are of the utmost importance here.
Vienna-Cortaccia: an equal partnership
“The collaboration with ewo and above all with the founder and technical director Ernst Wohlgemuth was truly equal,” says Gerald Wötzl, head of the technical competence center of the MA33 – “Wien Leuchtet”. «The ewo company responded quickly and with a high design capacity to all requests, always keeping its word reliably». In this way it was able to meet all the stringent requirements set by the MA33. As Wötzl says: “Our goal is to make Vienna the city with the best lighting.”
“Being able to establish itself in the highly competitive tenders of the city of Vienna and now being able to provide a light to feel good in this culturally rich metropolis of Vienna is a milestone for our company that we are proud of”, say the managing director of ewo Hannes Wohlgemuth. “One evening we asked residents of a park in Vienna that had already been converted if they felt a difference in lighting. The answer was that the way home in the evening is now much busier and the footpaths much better lit. Then we know that we can be proud of our daily work ».
Standard and Vintage: the entire spectrum of light
The ewo company emerged as the best offer in two tenders in Vienna: the new luminaires for the Reichsbrücke in Vienna will be supplied together with the other vintage luminaires (small and large luminaire for the center of Vienna and small and large luminaire for the subway), as well as the standard device K0. The housings of these luminaires have been optimized by the MA33 so that the light source can be inserted quickly and easily. There are about 5 different LED inserts for the K0 luminaire for all needs of the city of Vienna.
For Vienna, at the request of the city, ewo was able to produce the exact shape of the original “lily of the valley” luminaire in aluminum. The so-called vintage luminaires are used in the historic city center, for example in the Rotenturmstraße shopping street and in the Schillerpark, the park of the Academy of Fine Arts. Used for the lighting of the city center, the so-called lily-of-the-valley “bell shapes” through the drawing process.
Kaiserbadschleuse: Public space becomes a living room
The Kaiserbadschleuse and the promenade along the Danube were equipped with 23 devices of the type K0 from ewo. «Light fulfills a social mission and strengthens the feeling of well-being in public places at night – a kind of technological bonfire. The light is there for everyone, not just for a single individual, and thus democratizes a common potential, ”explains ewo CEO Hannes Wohlgemuth.
«The lighting fixtures represent a significant contribution to safeguarding the planet. Only in phase 1, in fact, the total lamps with LED lamps saved 60 per cent of the energy for more than 700 tons of CO2 per year. This is a fundamental improvement for the “model city for the climate”, ”reports city councilor Ulli Sima, who is responsible for lighting. It is a further step in the direction of resource conservation in the sense of the Smart City strategy, whose goal is to reduce final energy consumption per capita in Vienna by 30 percent by 2030 and by 50 percent by 2050 compared to 2005 year.