Light Pollution | Portree Post Office - badly tilted floodlights

Colin Dunn

2006

Portree Post Office - badly tilted floodlights

I regularly travel to Portree, on the Isle of Skye, to visit friends. Every time I pass the PO Delivery Office on Dunvegan Road and see these lights, I wince. They're asymmetric floodlights designed to project light downward and forward when mounted horizontally. Here they are almost perpendicular, which means that they shine their light nearly 45 degrees into the sky. Not only does this mean that all of this energy is being wasted, but also that the car park itself is poorly lit. A minor adjustment would rectify both problems.
This is an especial pity, as the growth of light pollution on Skye is in an early phase (hasn't caught up with the rest of the UK - though Portree seems to be trying hard :{ ), and the view of the Milky Way in the night sky is breathtaking.
Picture Added on 25 October 2006.

Comments

Get a grip. The red arrow isn't even pointing in the direction that the lamps are tilted, they go down, the arrow goes up.
Added by Mush Better than thee on 31 March 2009.

Um, I think you need to read the original description again. Asymmetric lights shine light forward at about 45 degrees when the light's face is at the horizontal, so when they're tilted, as these are, at about 70 degrees above the horizontal, the light shines upwards into the sky and is, therefore, wasted.
Added by Colin (Editor) on 31 March 2009.