Correct Height of 1950's Street Lamps?

Height varied with locale and style of street light.  Best is to Google "1950 street scenes" to make a determination.

Rusty

Here is a picture of street lights in 1960 in Spencer, Iowa.  I'm guessing they are about 20 feet tall or so?  They look about the height of a two story building to me.

Thanks Rusty and Chugman.

I'm thinking 18-20 feet will be fine.  I'm looking at photos of the prototype.  Modeling the area accurately is a lot more complicated than you might think.  Many, many details.  And of course, my tendancy to over-think it.

George

George - I can definitely relate to the overthinking it.  I am thinking my best bet will be to take Walthers HO street lights with the correct head and make new poles and arms out of brass so they are the correct height.  I think I can get my son to do it for me when he gets done making a large signal bridge for someone.

Art 

Art,

You know what has truly amazed me?

There are NO commercially available telephone (utility) poles with working street lamps.  I mean NONE.  Life-Like made something back in the 80's but it was non-functional.

Lionel makes something that works, but is totally bizarre - 2 lamps and the arms are wires (see the pole to the extreme right).  And the price is insane.  How cheesy is that?

Hence my question.  I am making these myself out of sheer necessity.

George

I was excited about the news of Atlas' new O gauge street lights.  They are LED which is great, but unless you are modeling very modern styles I didn't see the styles that I want.

Art

The height varied, not only depending on locale, but also on the type of street lights that were used.  Matt

Here is a PDF of the Lighting section of the New York DOT Street Design Manual.  This includes modern street lights and historic designs like the TBTA pole, Bishop's Crook, Type B, Type F and Type M.  Diagrams with height and reach are given for each type of lamp. Lamp pole heights vary from 18 feet to 30 feet.  Trolley wires in former years were generally 18 to 20 feet above the pavement.

Street Design Manual introduction is here.