The trees in downtown Saline are about to be lit up with holiday cheer, only for much less money this year.

The city removed the traditional holiday lights on downtown's foliage after they reached the end of their life cycle earlier this year. Since then, local officials have raised several more thousand dollars to replace them with energy-efficient LED lights.

The project cost about $36,000. The city promised to chip in $10,000 if downtown officials could raise the rest. That didn't turn out to be a problem, and the lights are set to start glowing within the next few days.

"We had a couple of large contributions," says Art Trapp, the downtown development director for the city of Saline.

The 50,000 lights usually cost $10.40 per day to light. The LED lights only cost $2.40 a day.

LED lights are much more efficient than normal incandescent bulbs because they only produce light visible to the human eye. That requires far less energy. LED also have a significantly longer lifespan.

Ann Arbor made a similar move with its downtown trees last year. It's also replacing its downtown streetlights with LED bulbs and plans to extend that to streetlights throughout the city.

Source: Art Trapp, the downtown development director for the city of Saline
Writer: Jon Zemke