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Why We Need to Keep Our Night Skies Dark (Video)
Kelly
Beatty has a unique perspective on the world of astronomy:
Beatty's been on the staff of Sky & Telescope magazine
for nearly 40 years as a writer and editor, including a stint heading
"Night Sky" magazine. He's also written what's been called "the
definitive guide for the armchair astronomer," and teaches astronomy
to people of all ages. (He even has an asteroid named after him.)
Besides being fascinated with the objects we can see in Earth's skies,
Beatty takes the skies themselves seriously: his Twitter handle is NightSkyGuy for a reason. We talked a few weeks ago, in
dark-skied rural Maine, about his involvement with the International Dark-Sky Association,
and why you should care about ubiquitous light pollution, even if you
don't have a deep interest in star-gazing. (And it's not just to be courteous
to your neighbors.)
it may seem so intuitively, but research is inconclusive. Bright night-time lighting produces sharp shadows that bad guys can hide in, and reduces the eye's ability to detect peripheral movements.
See http://cops.usdoj.gov/Publications/e1208-StreetLighting.pdf
and http://keysso.net/community_news/May_2003/improved_lighting_study.pdf
I have been in well-lighted gated communities where the lighting was well designed; you could clearly see around you for safety but light pollution was minimized, such that you could luck up and enjoy a great view of the sky. How did they accomplish this? They installed the lights properly, such that all of the light was aimed down at the ground on and surrounding walkways. It was very safe, minimized light pollution (you cannot eliminate it because some light will reflect off the ground and of course off of fog), and of course, very "green" because all of the light produced was aimed at the ground.
I live in Lee, NH - on most nights, except when the moon is at or within a couple of days of full, I can see the Milky Way very clearly - I consider our sky to be very dark, but by astronomical standards it isn't (compared to oh, say, north-central Maine, Antarctica, northern Canada, and central Australia - or North Korea where the only people who have lights is tyrants). The only (clear) nights I cannot see the Milky Way is Friday Nights, when the NASCAR track has events going on - when I drive by there it pisses me off. The lights are installed improperly, spraying probably >70% of the light produced straight up into the sky. This is commonplace in the city, where people are ignorant asses and I get that, but this is rural NH. Why the hell are you assholes at Lee Speedway wasting all that electricity to produce wasted light, rendering the sky unviewable? When it comes up for vote, I will be voting to NOT give them an extended season, and if the vote is at a town meeting I will explain why - it won't be the noise, nor the traffic, but the light pollution.
I don't mind the noise of the cars (hell I love engines as I'm a motorhead myself, having driven many muscle, sports and exotic cars, and having rebuilt several engines myself, but the idea of a race where you only turn left bores me to tears) but the light pollution is awful; it ruins one of the best aspects of living in a rural area.
Lighting fixtures are stupid-easy to select and install properly.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Flagstaff, it should be noted, was the first official international dark sky city. Every time of year except for now (the two-month rainy season), you can almost guarantee a good night's viewing. The seeing is generally better than Tucson (we're at 7000 ft/2100 m, so less atmosphere), though it can really cool off at night (again, less atmosphere; low tonight is 52F/11C). The streetlights are fewer and low-pressure sodium, but the main light-pollution difference is that high power floodlights are banned.
And yes, I am an astronomer here in Flagstaff.