Outdoor Lighting and Crime - Amper

“… people attach importance to the existence of nature and to the knowledge that
they can visit places set aside for nature, even if that nature does not play a major
role in their daily lives.
There are even moments when it can be consoling to consider that human life, with
all its woes and troubles, is an infinitely small part of life in the universe. Such
thoughts may not provide sufficient grounds for a religion but, in a world full of
suffering, they can be a help in finding a healthy balance and an antidote to the
paralysing power of despair.”
There are more quotations about the calming and mystical aspects of the natural night sky in
CPRE (2003).
It might seem easy to dismiss the importance of the night sky for many people as often akin to
astrological nonsense, but the issues are deeper than that. In Australia, for example, the
‘Dreamtime’ creation myths of the aborigines were, and in some cases still are, a fundamental
part of their nomadic life. These myths have an intimate connection with features of the night
sky, including the Magellanic Clouds and the Milky Way with its dark nebulae. 108 These
features are extremely vulnerable to loss of visibility from artificial skyglow. Their fading
from view has had a largely unrecognised but possibly serious effect in accelerating the loss
of indigenous culture and its resulting social ramifications.
Native peoples in other parts of the globe have been or are being subjected to similar
destructive effects on their culture, identity and self-esteem. For example,
“Native Hawaiians have been denied many parts of their culture by the destruction
of the Hawaiian environment, and light pollution contributes to this denial by
harming wildlife that are part of Hawaiian culture, and obscuring the stars which are
central to Hawaiian's history as navigators and settlers of Polynesia and the
Hawaiian archipelago…” (Altenburg, Maberry and Sutrov 2002).
Careless and wasteful outdoor lighting practices, together with the failure to prevent escape of
indoor light at night, not only lead to increased crime and neighbourhood obtrusive lighting
nuisances but may contribute to collective cultural offences as well.
Hollan’s suggestion is not seen as an alternative to the explanation proposed in Section 4.4.2
above. The two processes could presumably coexist quite readily, perhaps with adverse
synergistic outcomes: the lost calming effect could add to the Table 2 reason ‘Lost inhibitory
effect of darkness’, which derives from the lower crime rate observed in rural settings and
dimmed cities.
“Aurora metropolis pollutes all our lives. It may not rot your lungs, but it erodes your soul”
(Pearce 1995).
108 Some scholars of Australian aboriginal astronomy have described ‘Dreamtime’ beings
such as the Emu depicted by dark nebulae in the Milky Way. Such ‘starless constellation’
figures were thought to be unique but they have also been identified in Inca culture (eg
Channel 4 2000) and others.
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