Molnár József - Szilas Péter: Night Lights - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1993)
Energy efficiency It was in the late seventies when the world had hardly recovered from the first oil crisis and when Hungary was still under the illusion that it was safe from such “capitalist diseases”. It was the afternoon before New Year’s Eve. Everybody was just going through the motions of work, looking forward to the night’s events, as this day, officially still a working day, had long been regarded as a virtual holiday. It was then that the duty officer’s telephone at the Electricity Works began to ring. The caller’s words left no doubt that by now even the country’s top political leadership was becoming aware of the depressing energy crisis. Many of them had seen on their way from their residences on Rózsadomb, the city’s elite residential neighbourhood, to their offices that morning that the street lamps were on long after daybreak. What a waste of precious energy! “Turn off all public lights!” came the urgent command. What had actually happened was that due to some partial failure in the central control board some sectors in the public lighting system had to be switched on manually on the previous night, and the mechanics thought that it would not be worth their trouble turning them off by hand again on the morning of St. Sylvester’s day only to turn them back on when New Year’s Eve came. And who would care about a few burning lights on a day like that anyway? Decorative floodlighting was the first victim of the energy crisis in Hungary. What could have been reasonable economy was badly misapplied here. It is true, however, that the same kind of mistake was made in a few highly industrialised countries, too. Although experts tried their best in the news media to prove that such measures had little to do with energy conser- vation-they cited statistics to show that floodlighting all of Budapest’s monuments for a night consumed no more energy than just two average households would do in a year-it was politics that had the last word in the matter. Arguments had little sway when the centralised power could always have its way. From the next tourist season on, only six sights were allowed to be illuminated. Later on, the operating hours of decorative floodlighting was modified by regulations issued by local councils, and the burning of “half-night” lamps was reduced by two hours. With the exception of state holidays, only twenty objects, those regarded as the most important, 48
