Light Pollution

[GordonCopestake]

At least Wrist Rockets Steve hehe

[FLO]

BTW, some streetlights have a light sensor perched on top of the light; a carefully aimed laser pointer will give about 10 mins darkness

[Albireo380]

BTW, some streetlights have a light sensor perched on top of the light; a carefully aimed laser pointer will give about 10 mins darkness

Or you could hire Dumbledore - doesn't he have some sort of street light zapper? :salute:

[The Warthog]

I'm a fair shot, but I don't think my air rifle could break the glass at that distance. Besides, my wife would probably turn me in! :pirate:

[daz]

BTW, some streetlights have a light sensor perched on top of the light; a carefully aimed laser pointer will give about 10 mins darkness

Or you could hire Dumbledore - doesn't he have some sort of street light zapper? :salute:

A Put-Outer

<ahem>

[G1ZmO]

I wrote to my council (South Lanarkshire) to complain about light spillage from a streetlamp at the bottom of my neighbours garden and the council wrote back to say that they were going to fit a blackout to combat the rearward light spillage. However I'm still waiting for it to happen lol.

My original letter is here: http://www.paulstephen.com/astro_streetlight.htm

Cheers

Paul

[FLO]

I feel sure they will respond .... eventually!

Good thread this

[geppetto]

Paul

How long have you been waiting since they agreed to do something?

[geppetto]

Another response this morning and a little bit closer

Dear Philip Thompson

Thank you for your email, which I have sent through to our street

lighting department.

Fingers still crossed

[Ambermile]

Don't hold your breath, they only work nights there...

[G1ZmO]

Philip, I wrote to them on May 13th and got the reply on June 28th so the reply was almost 3 months ago. Just hope they do it THIS winter

[geppetto]

Paul

Have you heard anything from the council yet?

Nothing here so far

Looks like a lack of intent to do anything by my lot..

Time for some prodding :whip2:

[G1ZmO]

Actually I called the council contact last week and he said "I have an email here from the contractors saying that it's been done"

I assured him that it hasnt been done and he said he'd get someone on to it asap

I think its more a case of council dont actually do anything until they get chased up.

So, fingers crossed

Paul

[Albireo380]

Paul, ever wish you had that we "gizmo" that Dumbledore had - the one that turns off sterrt lights - I would use it on about one in three lights in Glasgow.

The only other option is a .22 - but as that would be illegal, I couldn't even consider it :nono:

Tom

[G1ZmO]

LOL Tom

I must admit to having tried the "laser beam onto the streetlight sensor" method but it didnt work

I have 2 lamps that really cause me a problem. The one they are (hopefully) going to shade and one across the road which they wont shade because they'll only shade from backward spillage

Once the first one is shaded then I can kind of hide in the lee of my garage to get away from the other one though.

Then theres the security lights from BOTH neighbours! grrr

Think I'll just have to get back out to the moor

Looking forward to Loch Doon on Saturday though

Cheers

Paul

[The Warthog]

LOL Tom

I must admit to having tried the "laser beam onto the streetlight sensor" method but it didnt work

I have 2 lamps that really cause me a problem. The one they are (hopefully) going to shade and one across the road which they wont shade because they'll only shade from backward spillage

Once the first one is shaded then I can kind of hide in the lee of my garage to get away from the other one though.

Then theres the security lights from BOTH neighbours! grrr

Think I'll just have to get back out to the moor

Looking forward to Loch Doon on Saturday though

Cheers

Paul

I used to be able to put out the streetlamp across the street with a laser, but for some reason, I haven't been able to this year. The city hasn't done anything to the streetlamp. Maybe I should try new batteries. The light only stays out for about 8.2 minutes, anyway.

The streetlamp on the corner burned out over a year ago, and hasn't been replaced. I'm not calling to tell the City about it, and I don't think anyone else has noticed.

My neighbour has bright halogen coach lights on the front of his house, but he is pretty conservative about them, and usually puts them off by 11, and sometimes earlier if he doesn't have anyone over.

Still, I don't need a torch to find my way around, even on moonless nights.

[OXO]

The older style Lampost's used to have a box near the bottom and when given a swift kick it would put the light out all night......

So ive heard

[tom.yates]

Seems to be getting worse everytime i look mate.

[radioactive]

strange thing occurred early last week I don't know if any thread were started about it but where I live the council thats Leeds city Council put out a press realease on BBC TV news or the local look north programme that they were extremely please to announce that they are going to employ white light all over the metropolitan area and this will definately help astronomers to see the star lights much better than the present system/s it employs

It even had some Kinda high ranking Astronomers on it from I believe Leeds AS say yes its going to help everyone no end and will get rid of the red glow totally over the city its also cheaper for them after an initial layout of some 190,000 of the folding stuff

Did anyone else see this news item I wonder ??

[geppetto]

Yep

Saw that on Look North I think

Be interesting to see what the outcome is.

I suppose its swapping orange for white light but at least the

new lamps look more shrouded to cut down the sources of up lighting.

Whatever happens its a step forward and puts the problem in

the public eye (pun intended )

[Kaptain Klevtsov]

Yup, I saw it and was puzzled. The astronomer guy they spoke to had some HUGE RC or similar to play with. Looked 20" or more.

Hopefully they are starting to use technology to aim the light, rather than just hope, and much more of it is going where its wanted and not up. Big problem is that the light needs to be reflected off stuff in all directions otherwise the object is not lit up. I hope that the new lights are some super duper invention that has totally filterable light so we don't get stuffed up by it.

Captain Chaos

edit:- link here http://www.leedstoday.net/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=39&ArticleID=1430029

edit: - complaint link here http://www.leedstoday.net/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=103&ArticleID=1774422

[G1ZmO]

Excuse my ignorance but how do white streetlights provide an improvement over the orange?

[radioactive]

Excuse my ignorance but how do white streetlights provide an improvement over the orange?

Well looking at it not as an astronomer for a moment its a vast improvement for all the cameras we have all over the place in white light they can distinguish one face from another with much greater accuracy therefore making it easier to identify crims

as for the astronomy side light that is more shielded and not allowed to glow upward is going to have an enormous benefit to astronomers as we can see more with there being less pollution of light up there just like looking out of a window at night really if you switch your own room lights off you can see loads better

IMO

[Ambermile]

Trouble is that the white lights tend to be mercury vapour - hard to get rid of.

Arthur

[scotty365]

Or Metal Halide. More balanced light and more in the blue end of the spectrum if Im correct.

The real orangey glow comes from low pressure sodium, high pressure sodium had a less orangey effect but seem to be everywhere these days.

I never noticed how much LP there has been around me all my life untill I went to the Peak District camping one night. I remember this cloud that stayed stationary for hours - and then it slowly dawned on me it was the milkyway - it was the first time I'd seen it and pointed it out to a few people nearby, within 10 mins half the camp site was staring at the sky and saying WOW alot!!

Scotty