Cities from Space - Detroit

Here is the Motor City - Detroit, Michigan - as photographed December 9, 2010 by the Expedition 26 crew of the International Space Station:

Image from NASA's The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth

I believe that somewhere in this photo is the suburb of Detroit known as Highland Park, Michigan.  The community recently made the news because it no longer has enough money to keep its street lights turned on.  Something like a 1,000 of them are physically being removed from the city.

Budget shortfalls are starting a return to lower levels of illumination in many communities in the U.S. and the U.K. In many places there seems to be great fear associated with this, but there are studies that link more light with more crime - not less. In the U.K. they are finding that the crime rate is indeed going down after streetlights have been removed.

If people can overcome their fear of the dark we can return to more natural levels of nighttime illumination and our nation's taxpayers will save significant amounts of money by not wastefully illuminating the night.