Light Pollution from a Private School

[TrevorW]

I am having an extended argument with the Local Council about the light pollution from a private nearby school that burns flood lights all night.


The Council doesn't seem interested in abiding by their own by-laws nor seeing whether the school complies with current AS regarding exterior lights.


The council stated -


Through the City’s investigation we were unable to establish any non-compliances, all flood lights were angled down towards the ground and provided a lux reading significantly less than the prescribed 50 lux even on site within the premises bounds. The City also failed to observe a significant nuisance from your property as grounds for written direction or enforcement of the City of Armadale Environment, Animals and Nuisance Local Laws 2002.



Australian Standards are guidelines for best practice and unfortunately the City of Armadale’s Health Services do not have the legal authority to enforce them


There are significant wetlands near this school. I also have a Public primary school and High school nearby neither of which have extensive light domes.



Attached is a photo this where taken from my house which is roughly 300 meters from the school, I did point out I was an astronomer but the council stated they couldn't see any nuisance (morons)



Any suggestions

[astronut (John)]

Trevor, I have a nearby high school that has installed the same high intensity lights through out their campus. These lights spread their beams over the entire suburb.
The only saving grace I have, are large bushes & trees that I use to filter out the light.
It's better than nothing, but still unacceptable.
Councils are useless and deaf to any opposite views.

[Nikolas (Nik)]

Epa?

[Scorpius51 (John)]

This is an increasingly important issue that is being ignored by most governments and councils. Not only is it incredibly wasteful of power, there are generations of people that have probably never seen the Milky Way. Fortunately some progress is being made at local levels. As an example, there was a segment on ABC TV the other night about actively controlling lighting.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-...tion/104240314

I really hope that this is adopted more widely around the country.

I grew up in Canberra and I can remember the time when I could clearly see the Milky Way. Not anymore from inner north of the CBD.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Trevor,
I sympathise with your situation but there’s not much you can do about it other than skip Council and approach your local member at State level as it’s a educational facility.He or She maybe able to offer some further advice.I suppose your one of only a few astronomers in the greater area but at least you’ve tried every avenue.

I too have a sports field 150m away with flood lights on most nights until 11pm ( late evening games and training etc…. )
Also my lovely neighbours leave all their exterior and backyard lighting on most nights until late ( for no apparent reason at all , there is no one in the backyard) see photo. I dare not approach them due to previous problems.
And yes my skies are Bortle 7/8 which makes my actual resultant Skyglow probably Bortle 8/9.

To be honest I was surprised imaging M20 LRGB and Ha LRGB about 2 weeks ago during new moon period using 30 sec subs and 8 hrs of data. The resulting image was quite pleasing using my Mono rig.

I’ll be adopting those short subs for Broadband imaging when skies are clear during New Moon.

When the moon is around my Antlia 3nm NB filters are tremendous and allow imaging under my crappy skies all year round.

Hope you eventually find a solution or some compromise

Cheers
Martin

[TrevorW]

Martin BB gun, in fact under our local council rules yours would be a nuisance. I'd check your councils Nuisance Laws and send photos if I was you

[TrevorW]

There has been many a recent article on ABC about light pollution and the effect it has on humans and animals alike. There has been stricter rules dealing with outside lighting under the Australian Standards. There has been policy changes at State Govt level to encourage less light pollution, yet Councils and the like are unwilling to enforce their own Nuisance Laws or do anything about it, which to me is just plain incompetence, it only takes once council to enforce laws to ensure lighting does not impinge on the night sky or your neighbours to see change occur. I suggested to the Council that the school should lessen the strength of globes used and shade the lights so the light is directed downwards but I think I am talking to a brick wall

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by TrevorW

There has been many a recent article on ABC about light pollution and the effect it has on humans and animals alike. There has been stricter rules dealing with outside lighting under the Australian Standards. There has been policy changes at State Govt level to encourage less light pollution, yet Councils and the like are unwilling to enforce their own Nuisance Laws or do anything about it, which to me is just plain incompetence, it only takes once council to enforce laws to ensure lighting does not impinge on the night sky or your neighbours to see change occur. I suggested to the Council that the school should lessen the strength of globes used and shade the lights so the light is directed downwards but I think I am talking to a brick wall

Trev,
I suspect the flood lights at the private school could be commercial integral LED floods and are not interchangeable to reduce lumen output or dimmable. So the only alternative would be to have anti glare baffles or anti glare reflectors fitted to direct the light to the task at hand , not spill 50% of it around the neighbourhood.

Cheers
Martin

[Leo.G (Leo)]

I have Red rooster, McDonald's and Burger King all within a stone throw of my back yard and they all LOVE their high output lighting. As for neighbours I'm lucky in the sense the immediate neighbours are always kind enough to turn off external lighting if I knock on their doors and ask politely, knowing I'll have telescope and camera in the back yard.
I still think I need a 22 to take out the street LED light across the road from the front yard, it lights my back yard up like an oval on game night.


A weird mention by an online friend in Arizona, he has a street light right outside his property across the road. He said he shines a laser at he thing 24/7 and has for years. Apparently their street lighting in his area is light dependant and the laser makes the street light act on it still being light. This fellow has lived in the same place for near 50 years I believe and his neighbours have no issues with the one street light not working. This fellow had an observatory in his back yard for many years.