Letter: Blinded by the light

Sir: I was interested in the article by Carl Gardner about light pollution ('Not bathing but drowning in a sea of light', 28 April).

This is not a problem confined to large towns and cities, however. Here in our little Devon town the assorted collection of busybodies known as the parish council decreed that the lighting on the small quiet estate where I live should be renewed. The time-expired, low-intensity mercury street lamps were replaced by the simple, but badly thought out, expedient of replacement lamp for lamp by high-intensity sodium vapour lamps. Consequently, the estate is so well illuminated, it is like a prison camp. Even Group 4 would find it secure.

Even worse pollution has been caused, however. Before modification, the lamps went out at midnight. Now they are on from half an hour before dark to half an hour after dawn. No one had the good manners to ask my wife or I if we wanted a huge orange searchlight eight feet from our bedroom window. The delight of the dark night sky is now lost to us and we have birds singing all night.

Yours faithfully,

JOHN F. MEAKIN

Colyton,

Devon

30 April