At its Dec. 11, 2023 meeting, Oak Bay council debated the style of replacement lampposts and streetlights to be used in the Uplands, first in the Humber catchment area, where replacement will occur in conjunction with the Uplands Sewer Separation Project, and later throughout the Uplands.
After extensive discussion about the lampposts, council decided, primarily on ‘heritage’ grounds, that the lights themselves should continue to be globes. This was against the recommendation from staff that the lights should be ‘dark sky compliant’, in keeping with Oak Bay’s Official Community Plan. The council discussion suggested that councillors thought that the only motivation for dark sky lighting was to improve nighttime viewing of the sky.
However, dark sky lights also reduce the negative impact of street lighting on birds and insects. The non-compliant globe lights are not particularly intense, so their overall impact may not be that great, but Oak Bay has a chance to show its concern for biodiversity, and set a good precedent for other districts, by changing its decision and opting for one of the dark sky compliant designs presented in the report from staff.
We even suggest that the original designers of the Uplands, if they had been aware of the issues, would have opted for dark sky compliant lighting or, in the present situation, would not want adherence to the original design to outweigh concern for the natural world.
Please write to the mayor and council if you think that their decision should be changed.
Chris and Elizabeth Garrett
Oak Bay