This bent-arm lamppost is one of a particular style designed for pedestrian overpasses, and likely first appeared in the late 1940s, certainly the 1950s. As a rule it’s used, or was used (of course it’s no longer produced) on expressway pedestrian overpasses and generally held a pendant AK-10 Westinghouse “cuplight.” Some of these were fitted with sodium “bucket lights” in the 1980s, while some still hold their old cuplights, though their bulbs have likely burnt out long ago.
This particular grouping, though, on the pedestrian ramps/stairs leading to the Tudor City Place overpass at the east end of East 42nd Street has been given some New Bell fixtures, imitating the ones used from the late 1930s-to the 1950s when the ‘cuplights’ supplanted them. Some of the new ones, like this example, use extended diffuser bowls.
12/9/13