EDITORIAL: Park's dark skies a vital resource

We dare say there are few things as spectacular as gazing upward at a sky full of stars shining brightly against the night sky. We’re fortunate to live in an area where the splendor of the night sky still exists, given the startling statistic that one-third of the Earth’s population now lives in places with enough light pollution to render the Milky Way indiscernible at night.

Glacier Park and Waterton Lakes National Park, which together comprise the world’s first International Peace Park, are now poised to become the world’s first International Dark Sky Preserve. This is wonderful news for our neck of the woods. Light pollution can be insidious, and even in the more than 1 million acres of wild landscapes within the two parks, the nights aren’t quite as black as they once were, park officials have noted. The time to do something about it is now.

Flathead Valley’s cities have been leaders in corralling light pollution. Whitefish took the lead well over a decade ago, adopting a dark skies initiative that put restrictions on outdoor lighting. And before that, back in 2000, Whitefish passed a sign ordinance that banned internally lit signs.

The city of Kalispell adopted its dark skies ordinance about 10 years ago, also putting parameters on what kinds of outdoor light fixtures are acceptable.

As our cities grow it will become even more important in future years to preserve our dark skies. Too many urban areas have become blinded from the night sky by acre upon acre of neon and fluorescent glow.

Beyond the aesthetic value of preserving the night sky, the importance of darkness to various wildlife species has been documented. Darkness is good for people, too. Studies have shown different spectrums of electric light at night can disrupt human biological rhythms as well as impacting the quantity and quality of sleep.

Many visitors to Glacier National Park are able to see the magnificence of the Milky Way for the first time in their lives. That alone makes for a trip worth remembering.

Preservation efforts like the one in Glacier and Waterton will allow future generations to actually see those twinkles when they look upward and recite the age-old rhyme: “Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have this wish I wish tonight.”

Our wish is that we’ll be able to see those stars always.