Britain’s streets could be getting darker soon, and not just because of the beckoning winter months. A fifth of our local councils have decided to leave residents and motorists in the dark, putting in place a government-backed plan to turn out the street lights to save money and more councils are due to follow suit.
So far the “blackouts” have been implemented in Buckinghamshire, Powys, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Somerset, Essex and Devon. Pembrokeshire council will be turning off street lights between 12am and 5.30am, which they say will save around £200,000 a year.
This has spurred quite a debate. The president of the AA, Edmund King, has been quoted saying that the blackouts could be a “recipe for disaster”. He argues that turning off street lights will not save any money at all due to the increase in crime and road accidents that the blackouts will cause.
The Daily Mail claim that the blackout scheme is the most severe rationing of road lighting since the power cuts of the 1970s and the political figure, Lembit Opik believes that it could send Britain back into ‘18th Century Darkness’.
Some constituents of the affected areas are worried about the increase in crime if it is too dark to see the make, model and registration plate of suspect vehicles.
Not to mention the millions of people that have invested money on personalised number plates that will now only be visible at certain times of the day…
Not everyone is against the proposed nationwide blackouts though. Astronomy groups have been lobbying government for years about the issue of light pollution so many are excited about the prospect of seeing Orion’s Belt in the UK’s skies clearer than it has been seen for decades.
So, is it naive of local councils to think that turning out the lights will save money? Does anyone care about the poor people that just want their cherished number plates to be seen? Or should we not worry about it, look up and enjoy the natural illumination of the North Star.
