When I was a young tot, the wonders of the heavens, the glorious
Milky Way and the beautiful dark skies were only as far away as my
back door on the corner of Washington and Hawkins streets right
here in Hollister.
When I was a young tot, the wonders of the heavens, the glorious Milky Way and the beautiful dark skies were only as far away as my back door on the corner of Washington and Hawkins streets right here in Hollister. Well, not anymore. Things evidently have changed. What has changed? The wonders of the heavens are still up there. The glorious Milky Way is still glowing. The problem is, we just can’t view them from our city anymore. And why is that?
Lights, lights and more lights. For some reason we just can’t seem to get enough lights. We have lights to see where we are going and looking, and lights, for some unknown reason, to light up the sky as well.
I’m not suggesting that night lighting is not needed. But just look around; we see waste lighting everywhere. Parking lots without any cars in them are flooded all night. Security lights pour into neighbors’ windows rather than over the target area. And most streetlights are so inefficient that as much as 30 percent, or more, of their output spreads horizontally, reaching only the eyes of distant drivers and any onlookers out of the intended lighted area.
This doesn’t just pertain to streetlights, downtown businesses and billboards signs, but also this means you and your home. Do your fixtures shine light into your neighbor’s window and toward the sky, or do they send all their light onto the ground? Can you see the bare bulbs from a distance, or are they shielded? Do you illuminate your house when no one is awake to admire it?
Reducing the glare from your home’s exterior lighting is a common-sense courtesy to your neighbors, who, like you, have every right to a dark bedroom at night.
If you want to see an example of this overlighting effect for yourself, just go to the top of Fremont Peak and look west and then look south. What are those large billows of yellow light? And where are they coming from?
Well, looking west is the city of Salinas; they could sure use a light ordinance there. But most of that light is coming from the new businesses and car dealerships trying to let the world know, as well as other worlds it seems, that here we are. Little do they know that they could provide even better and more economical lighting with a proper lighting system.
And now looking south, why there is another even more glamorous glow coming from the Soledad prison. I guess they want to stop any prisoners from escaping straight up and out. Once again, a better lighting system is in order here. It could save the taxpayers a considerable amount of money each and every year. And then maybe when we go to the peak to observe the heavens, we can do just that, observe the heavens and not lights preventing us from doing so.
At the request of many astronomers, a few cities, notably Tucson, Ariz., and San Diego have passed special ordinances that require all outdoor lighting to be efficient. Light fixtures are designed to aim down to light up the street, sidewalk and other targets and not the sky. But let’s give some credit where it is deserved, and that is to our own San Benito County for enacting their own dark sky ordinance. I was vary pleased, along with many others, I’m sure, to see our own county step forward to make sure that we do all we can to at least try to preserve some of the heavens for our own children in the future. Now we need to work on our city leaders to stop the large glow about Hollister. Of course they seem to have more pressing issues to deal with these days. But we can’t give up, as soon as the city is back on its feet, they will hear from others and myself on this subject.
Most people are against change of any kind, whether it is for the good or bad. A new ordinance in our city most likely would not make it mandatory for everyone to have to change existing lighting, but would only pertain to new construction and upgrades. If this was accomplished, our dark skies might not come back the way it used to be on the corner of Washington and Hawkins streets, but at least it wouldn’t get any worse.
Clear skies.
MAY SKY WATCH
May 2 Venus is at greatest brilliancy
May 4 Full Moon, called Planting or Milk Moon
May 4 Et Aquarid meteor showers peaks
May 6 Moon is closest to Earth (Perigee – 223,576miles)
May 10 Moon passes 5 degrees south of Neptune
May 11 Last Quarter Moon
May 12 Moon passes 4 degrees south of Uranus
May 16 Moon passes 3 degrees north of Mercury
May 19 New Moon
May 21 Moon is farthest from Earth (Apogee – 252,441mi)
May 21 Moon passes 0.3 degrees north of Venus
May 22 Moon passes 3 degrees north of Mars
May 22 Moon passes 5 degrees north of Saturn
May 24 Mars passes 1.6 degrees north of Saturn
May 27 First Quarter Moon
May 30 White Sunday (sometimes called Whitsun Day) it commemorates Pentecost, and is the seventh Sunday after Easter
David Baumgartner’s Sky Watch column appears every month in the Free Lance.
