San Francisco Pushes for Wasteful Night Light Ban

U.S. Lights at Night. Photo: NASA

An amendment to the San Francisco Environment Code that prohibits commercial buildings from lighting unoccupied interior spaces after business hours could help reduce the number of fatal bird collisions in the city. The ordinance, sponsored by American Bird Conservancy, was introduced in March by city Board of Supervisors President, David Chiu, and now awaits approval by the city’s Land Use and Economic Development Committee.

“The intrusion of artificial light into the night sky dramatically increases bird collisions by interfering with their migration routes,” said Christine Sheppard, American Bird Conservancy’s Collisions Program Director. “This adds another element of danger to an already dangerous journey for many neotropical bird species.”

The problem is particularly acute in San Francisco because it is located along the Pacific Flyway, a broad migration front that extends from South and Central America along the West Coast to Canada and Alaska. Golden Gate Park provides significant stopover habitat for night migrating songbirds, which are most often the victims of collisions with buildings.

In addition, more than 200 species of birds use the Presidio, more than 50 of which nest there. This island of green in an urban setting at the northern tip of the city, a military fort since the Eighteenth Century, is managed by the National Park Service and provides unique bird habitat in an otherwise densely populated city. The Presidio’s location on the northwest tip of the San Francisco peninsula offers a stopover location for many birds before they cross the Golden Gate Straits.

In another positive development, the City of Baltimore approved the addition of a Lights Out policy to their sustainability plan. The policy states, “Turning off non-essential lighting between approximately 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. can drastically reduce energy use. In addition to the financial and environmental costs of energy use, unnecessary lighting produces light pollution, which obscures views of the night sky and negatively impacts migratory birds, especially during their spring and fall migration.”