City needs to address light pollution

By Lethbridge Herald on February 10, 2022.

Editor:

If someone left the light on in your bedroom and you couldn’t turn it off, would you get a healthy sleep? If someone shined a light through your bedroom window at 2 a.m. would that be OK? 

Presently you have no recourse against this from happening. And we all need a darkened space for a good night’s sleep as much as we need sunshine during the day. 

And so it goes for the rest of the natural world. 

One third of bee and butterfly species are in decline, beset by various evils including man made ones like pesticides, changing climate and light pollution. Now the numbers and the science can give you everything you want to know about the damage we do to our planet. In great detail and painful logic. 

But science doesn’t have a good record of convincing people of much these days. 

So let’s try a different point of view. Money is a good start. Let’s talk about how the city will save tons of money by not having as many lights on. Or better yet, how property values could go up because Lethbridge will have something very hard to come by these days, “bee friendly” backyards. Or to further monetize the case, more tourism. 

Lethbridge could always use another attraction and having “zones of darkness” would be a draw for an increasingly LED-stimulated population. 

Let’s try yet another point of view and look at this issue from a quality of life perspective.

 Quality of life is enhanced by nourishing peoples connection to nature or at least providing them with an easy connection to nature. And in a similar way, when you take away access to darkness you inadvertently take away access to something that resonates with our human-ness.

I remember days of my youth spent in backyards with no lights, enjoying the night sky and listening to the insect world. It is an education and a feeling that doesn’t monetize well, but in fact it is priceless. And in these days of covid where we’ve come to pay greater attention to where we live, it’s important we nourish and enable connections to the natural world. Maintaining that connection to nature is something we are intrinsically obliged to pass onto the next generation. 

Finally, I took a look at the last Integrated Community Sustainability Plan as part of the Municipal Development Plan. The very first line reads “we will continue to work together to ensure that Lethbridge is a leader in environmental stewardship, innovation and active leadership.” 

Well Lethbridge, it’s time to walk the talk and support the light nuisance bylaw initiative.

Gilles Leclair

Lethbridge