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Petition to regulate light pollution

billyharris72

By billyharris72
in The Astro Lounge

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Physopto

Physopto

Posted
Posted

Numbers now up to 4309, a rise of about 300 in one day. If this trend keeps going we can do very well. In fact better than well. As of now still no reply from The Sky at Night, in fact the email was returned after 4/5 days yesterday with the note that it had not got past the incoming servers stack. In other words they are not reading their emails, possibly far too many being received causing an overflow. So I resent it! 

I also have not received any reply to the Astronomy  Now email sent all that time ago!

Nor to the email sent to the Irish Astronomical Association sent about three days ago! I only got their automatic receipt promissing a reply, so still hoping on that one.

As an addendum: I received a nice email from a Mr John Rowland who wrote thanking me for the add in AB&S. He has signed the petition. But the main point was he wanted to  know what SGL was? I will amend the advert to correct this. As he pointed out it may bring in new members as well as spreading the word on the petition.

John is a member of the York  Astronomical Society and author of  "A Guide to Practical Astronomy and More". It would be nice to see him join our forum.

Derek

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Nearly 300 signatures added in just over 24hrs is pretty good going.

Nearly at the 4400 mark. I have retried some of the societies in areas which have low take up on this so hope they have got the messages? 

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pyrasanth

pyrasanth

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Posted

I signed the online petition & sent the following email to my MP- have you done the same & badgered your MP- come on our skies need YOUR input.....

"Hi Caroline,

I’ve just signed the online petition to potentially debate & legislate the issue of light pollution which is infecting all areas like a cancer.

I’m a keen amateur astronomer based in Marston green. I’m completely fed up by my garden being bathed in horrible sodium streetlights which blaze all night for no reason & interfere with my enjoyment of the night sky.

I visited Cornwall a few months back at a dark sky location & the views of the night sky was simply breath taking compared with Birmingham. Our continued destruction of the night sky denies our children the right to see the universe in all its glory & yes there may be considerably more important issues on the agenda but it’s another issue that stabs at my heart.

Thanks for reading this far.

Best wishes
Mark"
 

 

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Physopto

Physopto

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Well my second attempt to email the Sky at Night has been returned unread. I received this in the Delivery Status Notification:

This is the mail system at host know-smtprelay-4-imp. I am sorry to have to inform you that your message could not be delivered to one or more recipients. The message is attached below. The remote mail system said: Maximum Retry Queue Age Reached
Basically they are not getting the mail I think because there are too many on their system. Not being read or replied to. :mad:

 

BUT, on the bright side just hit 4,500 signatures!

Derek

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psamathe

psamathe

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25 minutes ago, Physopto said:

Well my second attempt to email the Sky at Night has been returned unread. I received this in the Delivery Status Notification:

This is the mail system at host know-smtprelay-4-imp. I am sorry to have to inform you that your message could not be delivered to one or more recipients. The message is attached below. The remote mail system said: Maximum Retry Queue Age Reached
Basically they are not getting the mail I think because there are too many on their system. Not being read or replied to. :mad:

....

Derek

I posted it on their forum (which has a "Light Pollution" section) a couple of weeks ago and I think a few people noticed and have signed.  But the forum seems to be very inactive so I wonder about their web site/web presence (often it is the forum section that is most often visited on such sites).  Sites can often be about marketing things, forums are where the interested discuss all sorts of stuff.

Ian

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Physopto

Physopto

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Posted

Thanks Ian. I have tried several places. Also emailed Astronmy Now. No reply. So I will be discontinuing my subscription, if that is the way they behave!

Just set up a Twitter account. Tweeted Brian May and Dara O'Briain. See what happens.?

Derek

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Posted
Posted

A guy posted on the FLO thread with S@N magazine editor in his signature or something along those lines? Maybe he could help?

A lot slower today but still as many signatures as ghe previous petition that someone mentioned here earlier.

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Stub Mandrel

Stub Mandrel

Posted
Posted
21 minutes ago, Physopto said:

I have emailed to a different address.

Does make me wonder how they expect to keep subscribers though? Still could just be a glitch.

Derek

 

I've sent S@N two emails on other issues without a response :-(

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CSM

CSM

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Signed.  Are there any MPs with particular interests in astronomy?  They are the ones that might help and, even if this one gets nowhere, perhaps a private members bill might eventually do something. But the legislation does need to be sensible.  What about the campaign for dark skies?  Are they on board with this?

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Posted
Posted
18 minutes ago, CSM said:

Signed.  Are there any MPs with particular interests in astronomy?  They are the ones that might help and, even if this one gets nowhere, perhaps a private members bill might eventually do something. But the legislation does need to be sensible.  What about the campaign for dark skies?  Are they on board with this?

Physopto contacted Bob Mizon of the Commission for dark skies further up the thread. Another email could be beneficial though 

Approx 100 sigs in the last 24 hours which is still a good amount but more are needed. We are at least getting nearer the halfway point and it's the weekend so lot's more to come

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Posted
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23 minutes ago, CSM said:

Read previous posts. :mad:

Sorry - too many posts to read.

Here it is 

On 14/05/2016 at 12:01, Physopto said:

 

Well I am now in the position to post the emails as permission has been obtained.

"

On 14/05/2016 6:52 AM, Bob Mizon wrote:
Dear Derek
We have been promoting the petition vigorously via our CfDS Twitter and Facebook , and e-mailing astronomy groups and forums  about it. I have also put it in the agenda for the CfDS committee meeting tomorrow where we will discuss ways of further supporting it. 
I wish it success. We have been talking to DEFRA for 25 years about proper legislation to protect the night sky, and so far have achieved the limited legislation of the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act section 102, 2005; but of course our ultimate aim is strict control of lighting to specifically counter skyglow. 
All initiatives towards that end are most welcome. 
Best wishes
Bob Mizon
Coordinator 
BAA Commission for Dark Skies 

 
Dear Bob,
Thank you for the reply to my email.
I am afraid I am not a member of Twitter. I was at one time but was inundated with pointless emails and cancelled the account. I am on Facebook though.

To date I have never seen any of The CfDS posts concerning a petition. This suggests that your efforts are going unnoticed by many not just me. I have also not seen any posts on Stargazers Lounge concerning this matter, but it is easy to miss things if they are not emblazoned in bright lights! This is unfortunate as I would support almost any measure to clean up our environmental corruption of the night sky.

I must admit the short reply from Madeleine Davey was a bit of a disappointment, but now realise she was pointing me quite correctly in the right direction.

I am sure if these matters can be clearly brought to the attention of the members of SGL many of us  will add our support. To this end would you mind if I post your reply in its entirety on SGL.

If you email me  about future matters to do with "Light Pollution" or matters pertaining, I will post these on SGL for all members to see and comment on.

Some clear information on joining the CfDS would also be appreciated. One problem many do not like, me included, is if after joining any organisation they are constantly bothered with email after email. It puts many people off.

Regards,
 Derek Brown
 
Dear Derek
You are right that there remain various directions we can still try to get the petition rolling faster. 
I'll contact the Southern Area Group of Astronomical Societies (SAGAS) today to enlist their help, and ask Stephen Tonkin(CfDS webmaster to whom I've copied this) to provide a link. Steve is on SLG, I believe. 
Steve, the link is
 
Please could you add it to the website? Thank you. 
 
Derek, to join CfDS you need only subscribe to the newsletter which you can order via Madeleine Davey. £4 for 2 years' issues, 2 per year in spring and autumn. If you wish to contribute to funds as a one-off or regularly, please let me know. Just spreading the word about light pollution is more than enough, though!
Best regards 
Bob
"

 

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Galactic Wanderer

Galactic Wanderer

Posted
Posted
On ‎5‎/‎11‎/‎2016 at 14:14, billyharris72 said:

Just noticed this on the Government's petitions website. Not exactly setting the internet alight, but put my signature down there anyway. Thought others might be interested.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/119428

Cheers,

Billy.

Just want to say thank you to Billyharris 72 for noticing this petition! It would have gone completely unnoticed and would have never have even remotely reached 10k mark with out him telling us.

Seb

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caracol_uk

caracol_uk

Posted
Posted

It's clear that the momentum of the campaign is slowing down following the surge earlier in the week. This is to be expected as the huge increase was attributable to us contacting people with a vested interest in decreasing light pollution. Once that limited number of people has been notified things start to slow down, as I believe we're seeing now. We need at least 100 signatures a day so I think we need to find new strategies if we are to attain our goal. I've submitted an article for circulation around one of the institutes I work for which will hopefully generate some interest. I've also posted on my Facebook page in the hope that this will help. In case anyone else would like to do the same, feel free to copy my wording if you wish (or modify as you see fit). Here is my post:

-----------

I realise there are more pressing issues facing the world today, but please help ensure our children will still be able to see the stars when they grow up, as most urban locations have already lost the Milky Way. Loss of visibility of the night sky is a gradual process that has been happening over decades and consequently goes unnoticed to many people. Future generations are quite unlikely to realise what has been taken away from them unless we take action now.

For this reason I’m attempting to increase awareness of a UK government petition taking place to introduce legislation to regulate light pollution. Unfortunately the wording on the petition is a little vague, but the intention is to make steps towards ensuring that lighting fixtures direct light to where it’s needed rather than up into the sky. The link to the petition is below. 

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/119428

-------------

I also found an interesting report into the affects of light pollution. You may find this interesting (the double pdf extension is not a typo on my part)

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/228832/9780108508547.pdf.pdf

The other thing to think about is any local organisations you feel may be interested in signing up to the petition. My constituency has a very small number of signatures at the moment so I'm hoping to do something about that. It's easier for us all to take on responsibility for our local area, and although we might only be able to increase the numbers in our constituencies a little, hopefully the collective effect will make a big difference.

Have a good bank holiday weekend folks.

Simon

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