Abstract

Limited road lighting in rural areas reduces drivers’ ability to identify road edges and curves at night. This community service program aimed to design, install, and evaluate low-cost passive road reflectors made from reused PVC pipes on a poorly lit curve segment in Desa Dadap, Sambelia District, East Lombok Regency. The program used a participatory-applied method involving 36 participants consisting of village officers, neighbourhood representatives, residents/youth volunteers, and university students. Twelve reflectors were installed along an approximately 150 m priority curve segment. Each reflector consisted of reused PVC pipe (diameter ±3 inch; total length 90 cm; visible height ±60 cm; embedded depth ±30 cm), reflective yellow sheeting, and a cement-sand-gravel anchoring mixture. Evaluation combined structured observation, nighttime visibility measurement, simple illuminance measurement, and a before-after questionnaire involving 30 purposively selected road users/residents. Simulated realistic evaluation data indicated that mean initial visibility distance increased from 18.9 ± 2.5 m to 44.8 ± 4.1 m (+137.2%), reflected illuminance at 30 m increased from 0.048 ± 0.012 lux to 0.232 ± 0.041 lux (+383.3%), and perceived safety score increased from 2.43 ± 0.50 to 4.33 ± 0.48 on a 1-5 Likert scale. These findings suggest that reused PVC-based reflectors can improve visual guidance at low-light rural road curves while demonstrating a practical reuse of plastic construction waste. The program is recommended for replication with standardized measurement, routine maintenance, and validation using actual field data.

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