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UK light pollution map

Psychobilly

By Psychobilly
in The Astro Lounge

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Psychobilly

Psychobilly

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A 15 to 20 mile drive gets me into the green and about another 10 -15 miles on that gets me into the cyan...

A mates got a farm well into the cyan with mountain top 360 degree views at reasoanble height ASL... he's offered to Tractor me and the gear to the top of the mountain for a few days... if only I could guarantee the weather...

Salibury will be first attempt at field imaging with the CPC based setup - mainly because I cant get at the southern gems having 30-40 degree obstructions to the south...so it will be an interesting test for me...

Peter...

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Psychobilly

Psychobilly

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Problem is not just dark skies but number of clear nights and dark skies. Lots of the darkest areas are also the wettest and hence cloudiest. Places like East Anglia have probably the best weather and skies.

Regards

Kevin

I have never been able to make head nor tail of the combined LP clear nights maps thats the CFDS produce...

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Ant

Ant

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I'm in the yellow by a long way... I recon I have Mag 3 (maybe 3.5) skies most of the time.

But if I drive to my brother in laws house, which is about 10 miles as the crow flies, I gain at least 1 maybe 1.5 magnitudes.

Ant

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Beyond_Vision

Beyond_Vision

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Looks like South Wiltshire and North Dorset area would be ok. Plus the Lizard and Isles of Scilly as Pete has mentioned would be good. I have always dreamed of having a little islet in the Scillies all to my self :)

Just waiting for the comment from the missus about how will she get to Tesco's :D

Regards

Kevin

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Beulah

Beulah

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Outer borders of green, close to cyan here...but how accurate that map is, I really don't know.

In the northern skies here, there is the baleful glow of towns around 15-20 miles away, and it's impossible to see anything between 15 and 25 degrees

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James

James

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The CFDS site had (has?) some maps comparing cloud cover with light pollution. Whilst the colours chosen were pretty poor it did reveal on average that the best places when you compare LP and cloud cover were parts of East Anglia, parts of Dorset and a bit of the Cornwall coast near Bude...

I'll try and find the data again and post a link.

James

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tinvek

tinvek

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looking at the combined map im in a pretty good spot towards the north of anglesey, the airway is aprox 5 miles further north so doesnt cause many probs, now all i want to know is where are these clear nights im supposed to get?

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Psychobilly

Psychobilly

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The CFDS site had (has?) some maps comparing cloud cover with light pollution. Whilst the colours chosen were pretty poor it did reveal on average that the best places when you compare LP and cloud cover were parts of East Anglia, parts of Dorset and a bit of the Cornwall coast near Bude...

I'll try and find the data again and post a link.

James

Hi James,

I found it and posted a link - the one that has the air traffic on it as well just to cheer us all up some more...

CfDS: Maps of Light Pollution

looking at the key again I have more of an idea how to use it?

Whats the Philips one like?

Peter...

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James

James

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That's the one. :)

The Phillips map quite good. They've tried to use data like contours to show how LP is affected, for instance it shows quite clearly that the skies just 5 miles south of Taunton are quite dark as Taunton sits in a valley and the Blackdown Hills block off a lot of the light.

James

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Beulah

Beulah

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This one is a little more location specific with PDF maps of regional areas on the right hand side of the page.

CPRE - Campaigns

Using Google, I overlay a map over the areas to envisage regional borders and get a more precise zoned-in method of determining the quality of the night sky.

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Beulah

Beulah

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They do reigonal maps forEengland as well... CPRW doesn't do anything similar for Wales though :)

Peter...

That's because LP is virtually non-existent in Wales - in the Mid, West and North West regions - except the areas near Liverpool and Manchester :)

I travel to Wales (Powys, Gwynned & Ceredigion) on an extremely regular basis, and when the skies are clear, wow!!

The Irish & Scots are lucky too....:)

Seems you Celts know a thing or two about keeping those skies LP free...:D

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Psychobilly

Psychobilly

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Not on the Southern costal belt it aint... When they tap the blast furnace at Port Talbot...if theres any moisture at all in the air the whole southern sky lights up and its 7 miles away behind the mountains...

When we were at teh Moutain Center last year you could see the glow of the Valleys and coastal belt from over 30 miles... and thats with the highest peaks of the Brecon Beacons in the way... still got lost though when looking striaght up....

But luckily I dont have to travel to far for fairly good skies and if i was into observign ratehr tahn imaging i would travel more often, but I cant give up the stability of the fixed pier and the convenience of the the obsservatory and decent filters make a huge difference...

Peter...

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nitram100

nitram100

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That's the worst thing about the UK, if you live in a city or near one, which is usually always the case! You have to drive for hours to get to reasonably dark skies and to top it off it only seems to be getting worse every year.

When i went to Portland, Oregon last year i only had to drive for 40 minutes before i saw the milky way (for the first time in my life i may add) and the sky literally dusted with stars.

It's estimated that 40% of Australia is practically untouched by humans, oh man can you imagine the skies? :)

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