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12/06/2023 11:49 AMCONFIRMED
Janice Ross
130 Lakeside Drive, Guilford
650-906-6779
In the Nov. 23rd Courier, fellow Guilford resident Diane Bergen wrote asking the town to install 24-hour artificial illumination on "the flagpole" at Jacob’s Beach. This raises an important question about light pollution for the town.
In fact, rather than serving as a reminder of “shared values,” creating light pollution in such a sensitive wildlife habitat as Jacob’s Beach would achieve the opposite, adding to the multiple negative health effects of light pollution on local ecosystems and wildlife that depend on the fragile coastal area to be dark at night. Birds often migrate at night and light pollution can confuse them, disrupting their migratory patterns, fish too see lights reflected in the water and stop swimming past that area since they know it will make them susceptible to predators, but at the price of disrupting their search for food and migrations, plankton are less likely to come to the surface at night and excess lighting also attracts and kills insects. In humans, studies have shown that light pollution increases cancer rates – so the potential impacts are significant.
Recent legislation aligns with science in regard to the dangers of light pollution as this past June Gov. Ned Lamont signed a bill requiring all state-owned buildings dim nonessential outdoor lights after 11 pm. The Lower Connecticut River Valley has been a leader in enacting measures to restrict lighting at night, cautioning that negative effects of excessive night lighting on humans, “can affect health by disrupting our bodies’ rhythms, causing poor sleep, anxiety, headaches, and other health issues.” We all need to become more informed about how lighting technology at night is causing unintended, yet pervasive and harmful effects for wildlife and humans and we need act to reduce rather than increase this danger for all of us.
Janice Ross, Guilford