Why Must It Be So Bright Everywhere Nowadays? And Noisy Too

[DMF]

Here in Chicago the city is finishing up installing the Latest Super-Hyper-Bright Lights along the city streets - avenues - highways and all. It's an other-worldly sensation I get and don't like it at all.
Stores as well - super hyper bright white lights everywhere - especially on the trains & buses. "It's for 'safety' "
Now crime has jumped on the subways.
Loud music too at Walgreens, DSW Shoe Warehouse is like a discotheque - or what's supposed to be music more like noise. The Grammy's - what a joke! A headache no one needs after a long day.
We're becoming so desensitized it's sick....

 

[DavidGardner]

I wear my sunglasses at night....

Yes, and I also can't stand the LEDs these newer vehicles have now. I was given night driving glasses as a gift that cut down on the intensity of these lights and also make everything more of a yellow shade. They're great. Before I was using polarized glasses to stop from being blinded by oncoming traffic, but they were a little bit harder to see with.

I don't understand either why this is the trend now when we know it is bad.

 

[lvysaur]

Yes, and I also can't stand the LEDs these newer vehicles have now.

There should be a law against these lights, and the fine should be greater than a speeding ticket since it causes more harm (you can speed for only a few seconds, your headlights are on and disrupting other drivers for the entire trip)

 

[animalcule]

I find it incredibly hard to drive at night due to the new, ultra bright white headlights on cars. I've even seen people on scooters wearing headlamps with massive, ultra bright LEDs ... I don't think they realize that they're not really improving their safety when it comes to other cars -- instead of making scooter drivers more visible, they're instead just big, bright, **blinding** orbs of lights zipping toward drivers.

What's worse is that many newer cars seem to have their headlights turned on day or night. Just this morning I was driving around and realized that nearly all the oncoming cars had their headlights on. It wasn't nearly as bad to deal with compared to nighttime driving, but it was still maddening that even in the daytime you cannot get away from staring these intense LEDs in the eye.

Streetlights and house lights in my area are being replaced with the bright white LEDs, too. Instead of the warm, diffuse orange glow of the old bulbs, we now have bluish, INTENSE, hard light coming in. Some people seem to be very in favor of these lights: "It's for security!!!" Ok... If you want a light on your porch, fine, but does it really have to be as bright as a thousand white suns?? I've often wondered if these neighbors, when passing their exterior lights at nights, ever thought to themselves, "Hm... even glancing at my light momentarily gives my vision a halo effect for a while after... I wonder if it's an unpleasant (literal) eyesore I've installed for all of my neighbors to deal with?" Perhaps by the time they turn it on, they are safely in side their house and don't really have to deal with its effects from the street...

I used to walk around my neighborhood at dusk, but so many neighbors have installed "security" lights (read: 100x brighter, burning and intense than necessary) that it's no longer a pleasant stroll to wind down the day. It may seem like I'm being overly sensitive, but it is just so unpleasant and infuriating to have to deal with tripping motion-sensing "security" LEDs every block or so, in addition to permanently on porch lights (always 100x brighter than necessary, they illuminate the houses on either side of them as well) that I have to stare in the face for blocks as I'm walking, until I can get past them. Not to mention staring at the new LED healights on every other car, which hit me right at eye level as a pedestrian...

And the parks near my house! What I thought were my one refuge in my ever-more densely populated region... They've installed enough bright white street lamps to lights up a stadium in the parking lots now. And one park even had a whole to-do about their lighting project!! Because that's why people go to parks: to endure the same lighting they are subjected to in an office, but now outdoors! Cannot escape it!!!

I read an article a while ago that I'm going to try and find... It mentioned some US gov agency that was pushing a whole light-up-the-country-with-LEDs!!! initiative. Then the AMA came out and suggested that perhaps before pushing and funding such a project, they should consider the health effects of LEDs. I think maybe the tone of the light was then something of a consideration? But from what I can tell, no one around me seems to give a ***t about bright white LEDs.

I don't know all of the science behind all of the health effects of these intense lights, but what I DO know is that looking at them, or have by space illuminated by them, hurts my eyes and makes me feel hazy, sometimes my visions even drags (?) a little. Do other people not experience this?!?! How on earth did the creators of these things not look at say a new LED headlight and go, "Holy ***t, I am blinded. Best not put this creation on the road!" I just don't understand... It's just... I don't know. Void of human sensitivity? Is it because they are so energy efficient that people are willing to turn a (literal!!) blind eye to the horrid visual of this invention, because they (wrongly) assume that it is therefore good for the environment?

I have never really had to work in an office before a few weeks ago. Now, unfortunately, I do. One of the first things my supervisor pointed out to us as we toured the building was the installation of all the new light fixtures... You can't look at them for more than a second without it burning. Why. Why?!?!?! Maybe all the office drones are just numb to this lighting by now...

End rant.

 

[LuMonty]

The headlights are definitely an issue. I have an astigmatism in my left eye and though it's gotten better, night driving is incredibly difficult. Walking at night around town is impossible, at leas tit feels that way, because of the motion sensor lights. When I have people watching my every move it's almost worse than the lights. The apartment I live in is across from someone's backyard. They have a light that turns on constantly during the summer when they take their small, annoying dog out. The light is so bright (only after complaints did they add a cover) that I could read a book in my bedroom with a blackout curtain up!

 

[LUH 3417]

Yes I agree the headlights are assaulting. They are actually extremely dangerous considering I can’t see anything in the road for a few seconds after being blinded by them. The technocracy continues. It’s like everything that’s created is for the benefit of a technocratic alien species that hates anything soft, warm or fuzzy.

 

[DMF]

It's also like this on the Chicago Lakefront BikePath at night now . It used to be great on those Summer nights when you could go for a ride with the moon illuminating Lake Michigan to the side. It can still happen but not the same intensity from the interfearing lights dotting the path.

 

[Occidencel]

Night driving has frustrated me for a long time now. It seems that every car less than 15 years old has “normal” headlights that are magnitudes brighter than how “brights” used to be. Its completely backwards. Everyone is driving blind. But when I bring it up, nobody has even thought about it. Brighter better is the only thing that makes sense to my fellow man, and I feel more alone because of it.

 

[animalcule]

@Occidencel , completely agree. I just cannot understand how people are so accepting to these horrific lights becoming commonplace in my environment. In some ways, things like garbage pollution are somewhat understandable (though obviously not good) if you consider the fact that most people throwing their plastic away are going to have it hauled off to a dump, never to be seen by them again. It leaves their environment, and doesn’t directly affect the person throwing the garbage away. But light pollution: it’s all around us! People *choose* to install blinding floodlight on their house, or high wattage overhead lights in their offices. As far as the cars go, I partly blame the manufacturers bc most people are not going to be spending extra time and money to switch their lights out to less assaulting ones. And especially in cities and suburbs, where you have the highest concentrations of these new, terribly bright headlights — these are the areas with the most street lights!!! And the most cars on the road, which even with the old level headlights would be lighting up the street enough. Rendering the extreme brightness of these lights totally unnecessary!!

“Brighter is better.” I do understand how other people lacking any sort sensitivity or awareness to these lights can make a person feel alone. When someone comes babbling at you about how their safety is more important than your “sensitivity,” it can feel like you’re trying to have a conversation with someone so lacking in what you would hope are basic human sensitivities (or what you had thought were), that you have little common ground. How do you convince such a person that perhaps these lights, blinding as they are, make them less safe? Or that, in the case of stationary lights, they disrupt human circadian rhythms (as well as other animals), and can damage retinas and skin over time, and that because these lights are now everywhere, damage is more likely to accumulate? How do you even make the argument for basic consideration and decency towards people sharing your environment when to them, they don’t seem to be able to understand how assaulting these lights are on the eye?

It’s troubling to me because it almost feels like you have to explain why a certain string of notes is musical and another discordant, and the other person just keeps jamming his hand on the keyboard and going, “Look, sound wards off the wolves, I’ve gotta keep making sound for the safety of me and others, and this is the most energy efficient way to do it! *Bash bash bash!!*” You’ll just have to get used to it!”

Except you would think that it doesn’t take a special sensitivity for the average human to look at a blinding white light and think, “hey yea, I’d prefer not to have this a ubiquitous presence in my environment...”

 

[Waynish]

Because of "eco-friendly" idiots thinking LEDs are the best. They're good for cars, but they should adjust the color temperature at night.

 

[laleto12]

you can look into blue light blocking glasses. They are life-saving for sure!

 

[gabys225]

There are many varieties of blue light blocking glasses, going from no visible tint to full on orange depending on how much the lights bother you. I have the cheap funky pair that I wear at home that are huge orange and bulky, but have been considering something from the more chic brands since the light pollution is reaching absurd levels.

Gunnar and Felix Gray are 2 brands that come to mind. In fact, this snippet from the Gunnar website is pretty interesting:

"Our custom tints tune artificial blue light to enhance the physiology of the naked eye, increasing contrast perception and shifting the color spectrum for visual efficiency. Light from energy efficient computers and overhead fluorescent lighting consists of narrow bands of high energy light instead of the equally balanced, full spectrum light the human eye prefers.

Changing the color of your screen or brightness does not affect the quality of the digital light. GUNNAR lens tints filter and balance the transmitted spectrum, reducing high energy visible [HEV] light and warming the spectrum. By reducing harsh blue light, sensitive parts of the eye are engaged, increasing contrast. Filtering blue light from a backlit screen reduces visual recovery time and protects the eyes."


The best solution is accept them, wear them to protect yourself and forgot about the lights. Just keep your glasses on until it's become a habit. Avoid using them during the day because you do want bright light entering your retina, stimulating the production of dopamine. There's also the issue of light bleeding in around the edges, so finding the ideal pair is important as well.

 

[DMF]

One of the rationals is that these lights will help to curtail crime.
Now see the statistics....

 

[JudiBlueHen]

They bother me as well. In fact, I thought it was just my "old age" giving me problems driving after dark, but now that you point this out I am sure it is the intense blue headlights. I can't see the road stripes clearly for just a split second after one of these cars passes by. So if there were anything in the road, I would definitely miss it until too late.

 

[cats]

The irony is that those white lights make it more difficult to see at night. The pupil constricts far more in response to the blue part of the visible spectrum than it does the red and orange part. When you look at something outside of the area illuminated by the white light or are glared by the headlights of a passing car, your pupils will take some time to dilate again and your vision will be greatly diminished. This is why yellow and orange sunglasses improve night vision and why some car manufacturers (eg. BMW) use orange illumination for their consoles.