I wish there were completely dark places outside of my city that were easy drives. It takes me about 2 hours to get to a b3. b1 is about 9, with a decent amount of speeding. And the difference between the two is massive.
If you go talk to professional astronomers about this, they're pretty practical, and thankfully, they can be. The single biggest improvement we can make is shielding the directionality of the lights - and not using harsh bright white lights. Thankfully, doing both of these actually improves the usability for the lights for their intended purposes.
Down at the Macdonald Observatory in Ft. Davis they have worked with surrounding cities, industrial compounds, etc., to get light pollution down. I was watching a presentation they gave on the subject and a large industrial complex moved from fairly un-targeted bright white floodlights to the more yellow/amber lights that shielded upwards reflection - the peak brightness was lower, but it covered things much more evenly, didn't impact your night vision as much when working in it, which then kept darker spots from being pitch black holes like they were with the bright white floodlights. They improved safety for their workers - measurably! - and significantly reduced the amount of light being polluted back up into the sky.
And no, the loss of dark skies is a real issue. The article points out multiple issues not even related to human enjoyment of dark skies, but literally impacting our ecosystems. These are real and measured and not debated. If you are going to accuse this of being clickbait, perhaps engage with the actual points in the article and point out how they aren't actually of concern and why?
cadamsdotcom · · focus · HN ↗
While also - paradoxically - forgetting that there are plenty of dark places just outside your city if you're willing to drive to them.
Perhaps it's in service of baiting you to click.
cthalupa · · focus · HN ↗
If you go talk to professional astronomers about this, they're pretty practical, and thankfully, they can be. The single biggest improvement we can make is shielding the directionality of the lights - and not using harsh bright white lights. Thankfully, doing both of these actually improves the usability for the lights for their intended purposes.
Down at the Macdonald Observatory in Ft. Davis they have worked with surrounding cities, industrial compounds, etc., to get light pollution down. I was watching a presentation they gave on the subject and a large industrial complex moved from fairly un-targeted bright white floodlights to the more yellow/amber lights that shielded upwards reflection - the peak brightness was lower, but it covered things much more evenly, didn't impact your night vision as much when working in it, which then kept darker spots from being pitch black holes like they were with the bright white floodlights. They improved safety for their workers - measurably! - and significantly reduced the amount of light being polluted back up into the sky.
And no, the loss of dark skies is a real issue. The article points out multiple issues not even related to human enjoyment of dark skies, but literally impacting our ecosystems. These are real and measured and not debated. If you are going to accuse this of being clickbait, perhaps engage with the actual points in the article and point out how they aren't actually of concern and why?