ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Light Pollution

If anyone here has ever been to San Diego, CA you will notice all exterior lighting, both street and private property, is done with low pressure sodium lamps and downward facing lights with shields. This is due to the Palomar Observatory. There are bands laid out around this place with lighting requirements specific to each. The further out the band the less stringent the requirements. I just did a job that fell under one of the less stringent areas but it is about 100 miles away from the observatory as a crow flies.

The term is making it's way into the mainstream due to the boom in so-called Mcmansion (anyone understand the term?) housing. Many of the upscale ($600,00 & up) houses in my area are up-lit to the nth degree. I guess if you have it, flaunt it

Isn't it curious that years ago it was considered quite normal and adequate to have just a single 60W bulb in a room, yet in today's world where terms like "energy saving" and "light pollution" abound we have houses lit up like Times Square? (Make that Piccadilly Circus or Blackpool for my fellow Brits!)

Sparky,

Springfield, light pollution, new state prison, group in an uproar? STELLAFANE? Are you sure this isn't just a plot from an episode of the Simpsons?

I am an amateur astronomer and an electrician so I can relate to both sides of the issue. (I also sit on a zoning board.) I have installed lights that wouldn't create light polution. I have also installed a light that a neighbor called up and complained that the light I installed was too bright. ( We had to get a shield to block some of the light.) I also had to buy shields for lights (or side blinders as some are called) to prevent spill over of light onto the next door neighbor's yard. Most zoning/planning boards will allow light fixtures for parking lots but they usually ask for the "shoebox" or downlight type of lights. This way all the light shines down and not on the neighbors yard.

Harold

There is more, look here:

http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/cfa/ps/nelpag.html

Another pseudo-legal term is “light trespass.”

Presumably some time ago an observatory in {Tucson?} Arizona had problems with mercury-vapor light interfering with their work, and was fixed by replacement of area lighting with high-pressure sodium fixtures in outdoor areas. Ehh, there’s http://www.rasc.ca/light/print/ida-let.htm “Lost Heritage” http://www.nmt.edu/mainpage/news/2001/23mar02.html “Night Sky Protection Act” www.darksky.org/papers/rasc_art.html “mercury vapor lighting" http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/cfa/ps/nelpag/CIRC012.html “New England Light Pollution Advisory Group”

some goood links, i've heard of some of this..


lol!
it would make a good one... my van, with it's light bulb logo would most likely be the object of Bart's wrath.....

Right, wrong or otherwise...one way to deal with it is find a way to make money from it.