Environmental group takes dim view of Emanuel’s night light plan

BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter January 24, 2014 2:08PM

Renderings provided by the city show concepts of the lighting project along the river and "what may be possible out of the international competition".

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Updated: January 25, 2014 2:08AM

Mayor Rahm Emanuel was ridiculed Friday for suggesting that Chicago be turned into North Americas city of lights at the same time that Paris, the global City of Light, has toned it down.

Last year, the French Environment Ministry ordered Paris buildings and storefronts to turn off artificial lights between the hours of 1 a.m. and 7 a.m.

The environmental edict did not affect the Eiffel Tower and other major landmarks.

Drew Carhart of the Illinois Coalition for Responsible Outdoor Lighting said that makes Emanuels plan particularly ill-timed.

Its somewhat ironic that the mayor wants to turn Chicago into the Paris of North America when the Paris of France has finally figured out that creating lots of extra light to dump into the night is both wasteful of money and energy and really bad for the environment, Carhart wrote in an email to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Carhart bemoaned the use of electric lighting as a toy.Niagara Falls in daytime? Boring. We can make it look like a Disney movie at night with colored spotlights. The pyramids of Giza? You dont want to see them with the stars wheeling overhead, [but] lit up with multi-color glare and lasers, he wrote.

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Environmental group takes dim view of Emanuel’s night light plan