COLUMBIA — A 20-year-old Columbia native has been drumming up support for an initiative to bring programmable LED lighting to the city’s skyline.
Tripp Roche’s vision of a Soda City skyline lit up for holidays and University of South Carolina football games was inspired during a visit to Charlotte late last year.
“I just love how the (Charlotte) skyline looks,” he told The Post and Courier. “And it’s not really about copying Charlotte, it’s about taking what they’ve done and what they succeeded with and implementing it in Columbia in our own way.”
Columbia college student Tripp Roche surveys the future site of the Palmetto Citizens Credit Union headquarters. The new building will be the first to feature an LED lighting package Roche hopes to expand to the rest of the skyline.
CALEB BOZARD/STAFF
In the months since, Roche has met with Mayor Daniel Rickenmann, local business leaders and the owners and property managers of Columbia’s most prominent buildings to try to win their support for the initiative. Rickenmann himself has hoped the city would better utilize its skyline as a marketing tool.
Roche has reached out to officials in Charlotte for pointers, and connected with national and local companies specializing in high-rise lighting projects.
Only one downtown building — the office tower at 1901 Main St. — currently has such a lighting package. Capstone House on the University of South Carolina’s campus also has an array of lights that can be tuned garnet when a school team has a victory.
But Roche has been on the offensive, taking out columns in local media outlets and touting the project’s value as a branding boost for the city and building tenants.
Palmetto Citizens Credit Union new Sumter Street headquarters will include a programmable LED lighting package.
Chris Terlinden/Provided
The response has been largely positive. Two upcoming projects downtown were already planning similar lighting packages before Roche approved them — the new headquarters for Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union on Sumter Street, and the city office building at 1401 Main’s planned addition of a rooftop pyramid structure.
The developers of both of those projects touted their aesthetic impact on the neighborhood and skyline.
“From the very beginning of planning our new corporate headquarters in downtown Columbia, we knew lighting would play a key role in enhancing the city’s skyline,” said Chris Terlinden, spokesperson for Palmetto Citizens spokesperson. “While our dynamic lighting plans were already underway when Tripp reached out, it’s inspiring to see young people in our community who share our passion for illuminating and celebrating Columbia’s identity.”
Roche’s roots in the Columbia area run deep. He was born and raised here and his great-grandmother founded Italian restaurant Villa Tronco in 1940, which remains a city staple as the state’s oldest restaurant.
Roche, who is studying business at Midlands Technical College, is also the creator of Carolina Pong, a statewide table tennis club based in Columbia.
The City of Columbia is making plans to add a pyramid to the top of its Main Street office building.
City of Columbia/Provided
When will we see the lights?
Palmetto Citizens’s new building is expected to be complete in 2027. The city’s new pyramid is expected to go vertical around the same time, Roche said.
They will be the first to fall in line with the initiative, but Roche hopes there will be many more.
He has been in touch with the developers of the 27-story apartment tower coming to the Main Street parking lot next to the city’s office building.
Buildings of the Columbia skyline rise up across the city’s grounds, Thursday, January 30, 2025, in Columbia.
Henry Taylor/Staff
On the other end of the block, the owners of the Wells Fargo Building on Main Street are considering test lighting packages, a building representative said. Other prominent downtown buildings are following suit.
Roche expects the first new lights to hit the skyline around 2026, with the majority of the city’s downtown lit up by 2030.
“I don’t think this is ever going to be a completed project,” he said. “If buildings keep coming up, it’s going to keep adding to it.”
He’s now trying to get Dominion Energy and other potential corporate partners onboard. He’s also in talks to get the lights on the Statehouse dome replaced with programmable LED lights, as well as buildings in Five Points and on the University of South Carolina’s campus.
Becoming a reality
As Roche has made his rounds with local media outlets, one concern expressed in social media comment sections is the effect on local wildlife. Roche said he isn’t sure of the impacts.
Looking down the Gervais Street bridge the Columbia skyline rises up across the ridge, Thursday, January 30, 2025, in West Columbia.
Henry Taylor/Staff
Increased nighttime lighting, though potentially thrilling for onlookers and viewers of televised USC sporting events, could disrupt the migration and feeding patterns of birds and flying insects, according to Nikki Hartman, bird supervisor at Riverbanks Zoo and Garden. It could also lead to more collisions with building facades and windows.
“If we want to protect our migrating wildlife and the birds that call this city a home we should decrease the amount of light pollution, opting for smart light placement or joining a dark sky movement,” Hartman said.
Some ways to limit the negative effects would be too turn the lighting off between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. or during peak migration seasons, using red or amber light that is less visible to birds and installing shields to deflect lightning downwards as opposed to up into the night sky, Hartman said.