I'm trying to decide whether it's worth getting my parents to drive me over to the other side of the city for the sole purpose of asking for some lights that I may not even get. The lights are something I've been looking for ever since I started collecting and their rarity is beginning to border on the Unobtianuim end of the scale.
My parents are insisting that I send an e-mail so we don't have to take what may be a pointless drive but I know from past experience that e-mails have an extremely low success rate compared to asking in person.
A fellow collector who isn't on LG has told me what I need to say in order to get the highest possible chance for a successful outcome and even how to overcome the Health & Safety hurdle that always trips us up. There's also multiple loopholes in Australia's electrical laws that will allow me to legally do electrical work without a licence which will help me up my chances even further.
My main question is would it be worth the time and fuel to take a trip across the city that may end up being a waste of time and fuel or should I keep looking at Facebook Marketplace for something that just won't appear?
Even if I do end up saving the lights and posting the photos here, my luck won't even be enough to get a single comment on the photos as the lights are fluorescent and interest in them has declined to the point where even this almost Unobtainuim AJ Ferguson street light didn't get a single comment or show of appreciation from anyone here.
Should I talk my parents into taking me to ask for lights that I may not even get and if I did get them, the lack of interest in fluorescent lights will likely cause the photos to go unnoticed and without comments or just keep looking on Marketplace?
Serious answers only.

 This is a tough decision because distant factor.  I am in  Same boat here.   Where I live I am 1 hour away from any major cities in Texas.   When I find somthing like estate sales or Facebook market place.   It has to be somthing that better be good to worth the drive.  Also make plans to spend time on that side of
Town for that day.  For Example Let say I go New bransfels for somthing on Facebook for some free High bay fixture.  Well
My first stop in that town is usally allways  go to a metal recycling yard on my way to that city.   Then I go see a to pick up those high bay.  If that fails.  I got restores and thrift store
  That I can always stop in to look for lighting stuff.


   What I am saying here is to come up with a plan for general area so that it not a total waste of trip.  As Gasoline/ Petrol is very  expensive.  Even in San Antonio, Texas it large enough to
Drive 30 / 40 mins just get to one side to the other.  As a kid 30 years ago if I wanted to get on other side of town. Ive did it with public transportation by city bus and 3 hours of my time going one way.  Yes it make the day very long as somthing that takes 30 mins by driving turn into 3 hours by using city transportation
 I be on that side of town and ask for the lights and If i  do get it
 Then I would have to find a place to stash and hide the lights
  Next step is go pay the expensive taxicab to get the lights home that what I did as a teenager.  Back then I made more money than my parent combined!

The lights I want to save are priceless to me. I'll even show photos of my collection so I can tell them that the hobby does truly exist and just how special the lights are.   

I'm trying to decide whether it's worth getting my parents to drive me over to the other side of the city for the sole purpose of asking for some lights that I may not even get.

If it were me, I would just send an email & ask (or call if that was an option). Even if it was something I really wanted, I wouldn't drive across the city on only the chance of getting it...
...but that said: I'm old, don't have much ambition to go "light hunting" anymore, and simply don't want to waste the time/effort/gas to drive that far (I'm near but not in the city, lets say the lights were a similar spot but on the other side...that could be well over a hour drive one way). So it'd have to be basically 100% chance of getting it ... plus like funkybulb, I'd look to see if there was anything else in the area worth going to, to make the trip more worth it.

Even if I do end up saving the lights and posting the photos here, my luck won't even be enough to get a single comment on the photos

Again this is if it were *me* ... I would in no way base my going to get a light on whether or not pic's would get comments/views, but rather how much I wanted the light.

I'm starting to think about it more and since the place is a depot with no means of public access, my parents are suggesting making a phone call before planning any trips. This would save a potentially unnecessary trip if the plan was to fail when asking in person. 

My experience is that when sending an email or phonecall to a company, it is received by a random person at a rather low level.  If they are a kind person they might help you, but 9 times out of 10 they have a job to do and no time to handle such requests - it will be binned and you probably won’t even get an answer.

It is better to talk to someone senior at the company who may have more time, and I find that higher up staff have worked there longer and tend to be kinder to such requests.  But if you ask to talk to the top boss, chances are that some secretary in the way won’t even put you through.

So you need a technique to talk to that person.  In such cases I have found one thing that works extremely well, to bypass all the filters that might block your enquiry - and to earn the respect of the recipient and raise the chances that they will send you a reply.

It is the most simple thing in the world : send a hand-written letter!  When a letter arrives on your desk, everyone will open and read it.  Especially if the envelope has a hand-written address which makes it seem more personal.  Even more so if the letter is also hand written.  It takes the recipient time to read this, and by then you’ve already captured their attention and bypassed the risk that they trash your email based only on its title, or don’t even read it.  The reader will instantly understand the effort you have made to formulate your enquiry, and will most likely feel bad if they ignore your contact.  This greatly increases the chance that you will receive a reply.  It might still be a polite ‘no’, but at least then you did the best you could, and in that case it would probably also be a No if you drove over to the place.

There is still one last obstacle in the way : the secretary, who filters the mail of the boss.  So you must mark the envelope “For the personal attention of xxx”.  Do some research online and see if you can find the name of the general manager or company owner.  Secretaries rarely open personal mail, so that small step raises again your chance of being heard.

My experience is that this approach has a near-100% success rate.  I would highly encourage you to give that a go.  Unless you have rich parents with the time and means to drive you across town for what might be a wasted trip!

@James - I completely forgot about the option of sending a handwritten letter. I'm assuming that I would have to include my contact details so they can tell me their answer and so I can organise going to collect the lights in the case of a yes.
I already knew that the email method has a very high failure rate but somehow forgot about the old handwritten letter method.
I'd much rather spend just over $1 in postage costs than waste big bucks worth of gas.