Light Pollution

How does the Council investigate complaints of light pollution?

Under normal circumstance the following procedure will be followed:

• You will be asked to fill in diary sheets to provide written evidence about the number of incidents and how they affect you which must be returned to the Public Health Team.
• If the information supplied on the diary sheets indicates there could be a statutory nuisance being caused, a letter will be sent to the owner of the premises or the person responsible for the light nuisance drawing their attention to the complaint made against them.
• If there is no improvement further investigations will continue. This will typically involve a pre-arranged visit by officers, who will call at both properties if possible.
• If the department obtains evidence that substantiates the allegations, action will be taken to improve the situation.  This could require some form of informal control work being carried out, but usually involves serving an abatement notice on the person responsible requiring them to abate the nuisance or to control it or reduce the intrusion to a reasonable level deemed appropriate by the investigating officer.  Failure to comply with an abatement notice is an offence.