April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 20

CONSERVATION
The National Park Service has been
collecting and analyzing data used to
understand night sky quality for 20 years.
Measuring and Treasuring Our Night Skies
By Sharolyn Anderson, Ph.D., and Ashley Pipkin
T
he United States National Park Service's (NPS) Natural Sounds
and Night Skies Division (NSNSD) is located within the Natural
Resources Stewardship and Science Directorate. The NPS Organic
Act, Management Policies and Director's Orders provide
NSNSD with a mandate to protect the sensory resources of natural sounds
and night skies. NSNSD measures and assesses the acoustic and nocturnal
environments with new and innovative techniques that are based on peer
reviewed scientific research and provides highly specialized technical assistance
and guidance to 421 park units within the national park system. The
division also assists partners in their efforts to keep the soundscape and
night sky undisturbed by human noise and artificial light.
Protecting the night sky resource is
an important part of the NPS mission
to " preserve unimpaired the natural
and cultural resources and values of
the National Park System for the enjoyment,
education and inspiration
of this and future generations. " The
NPS has been collecting and analyzing
data used to understand night sky
quality for 20 years. Data is collected
with a state-of-the-art, charge-coupled
device camera, which provides a
snapshot of the entire sky, aiding in
the measurement of artificial
light
that degrades the night sky. Capturing
the essence of a lightscape with numerical
data is complex, but advances
in technology have made it possible to
accurately measure light pollution.
When analyzing the hundreds of
images collected at NPS units, one
thing NSNSD expected to find was
20 Parks & Recreation | APRIL 2 0 22 | PARK S ANDRECRE AT ION . OR G
a greater amount of light pollution
coming from outside park boundaries.
A surprising finding was that
many parks had lighting that was
not night-sky friendly and was, in
fact, a significant contributor to
park light pollution.
In an effort to improve lighting and
educate park staff, the NPS came
out with the resource Best Practices
- Night Skies. To assure that night
sky-friendly lighting was used in NPS
units, NSNSD needed to know where
the " bad " lighting lived. To better understand
lighting in NPS units, parks
began performing lighting inventories,
which are a way to collect lighting information,
such as function, shielding
and color temperature to quickly determine
if that light needs to remain,
be removed or replaced.
Through the lighting inventory
process, parks can ensure that they

https://www.nps.gov/subjects/nightskies/practices.htm https://www.nps.gov/subjects/nightskies/practices.htm

April 2022 - Parks & Recreation

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of April 2022 - Parks & Recreation

April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - Intro
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - Cover1
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - Cover2
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 1
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 2
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 3
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 4
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 5
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 6
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 7
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 8
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 9
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 10
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 11
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 12
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 13
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 14
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 15
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 16
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 17
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 18
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 19
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 20
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 21
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 22
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 23
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 24
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 25
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 26
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 27
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 28
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 29
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 30
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 31
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 32
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 33
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 34
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 35
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 36
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 37
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 38
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 39
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 40
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 41
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 42
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 43
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 44
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 45
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 46
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 47
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 48
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 49
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 50
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 51
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 52
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 53
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 54
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 55
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - 56
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - Cover3
April 2022 - Parks & Recreation - Cover4
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/december-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/november-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/october-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/september-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/august-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/july-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/june-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/may-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/april-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/march-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/february-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/january-2023
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/december-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/november-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/october-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/september-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/august-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/july-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/june-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/may-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/april-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/march-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/february-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/january-2022
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/december-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/november-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/october-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/september-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/august-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/july-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/june-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/may-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/april-2021
https://ezine.nrpa.org/nrpa/ParksRecreationMagazine/march-2021
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