Bus Trip Sheds Light on
Issue of Lighting
Cottone Field at WHS
~ ~ ~
Trip to Bloomfield High
Sparsely attended by
Opponents of Lights
Ken Sokolowski
Wethersfield, CT
2003.12.10 Wed
The bus was barely one-third full as it pulled away from the Wethersfield Town Hall today. The supporters of lighting for the Wethersfield High School's (WHS) Cottone Field comprised the majority on the dark, evening trip to Bloomfield, CT, to view its sports field equipped with low-spillage, Musco lighting.
The trip was arranged to allow the interested and influential in Wethersfield to have a chance to see what low-spillage lighting was like real time. The Bloomfield High School (BHS) field had the Musco lights installed about 3 years ago and they have been in active use for the past two years, according to a member of the BHS grounds maintenance staff, Tony Laury.
Among those included some but not all members of the current Wethersfield Town Council, the Wethersfield Board of Education, the Town Manager, Bonnie L. Therrien and Town Clerk Dolores Sassano. Councilors included Deputy Mayor John Karangekis[Cntr:Pix], Matthew Forrest. former Mayor Kitch Czernicki, and John Cascio. Though instrumental in arranging for the evening's excursion, former Councilor Dan O'connor was not able to join in - he was guest hosting RalphTalk!. Mayor Russ Morin, though not on the bus, met the group at Bloomfield High School{*}. Noteably absent were the more visible members of the Wethersfield Taxpayers' Association.
BOE members included Chair Stacy Hodges,[Lt:Pix] Vice-Chair Gerri Roberts, former Chair Penny Stanziale, and Martin Walsh. Also present were a few members of the "Wethersfield Youth Organization" (WYO), including Lou Sanzaro and Robert Peters both of Wethersfield. Peters personally paid for the use of the DATTCO bus. The WYO was recently formed to spearhead the Cottone Field Fund.
Rounding out the small, on-board tour group were a couple opponents and otherwise unaffiliated supporters of lighting of the field. Despite ample notice available to the print media covering Wethersfield, only local website Wethersfield.net attended. Finally, Brian McCarty, regional representative of Iowa-based, privately held Musco Lighting, came along to answer questions about the system installed at Bloomfield's field. He arrived a little late from another engagement in Massachusetts.
Passing out informational folders, McCarty [Rt:Pix] took advantage of the time on the bus to answer questions posed by those nearby, including Therrien, Czernicki, Peters, and Sanzaro. He was quick to inform all onboard that the visit would not be a fair example of Musco's specialized light because of the highly reflective white snow covering the entire field.[Pix] This, he emphasized, would throw the light far afield. An additional visit would be needed in the spring (2004) when lush, truely grass turf was visible field and reflection from snow was eliminated.
West Way residents (with homes abutting the north edge of WHS property and Cottone Field) Ronald Rodd (author of the "Rodd Report" of 12/1/2003) and his wife Judy Emmick (WHS guidance counselor) came along because of their concerns about the Cottone Field proposals, including the lighting.[Lt:Pix] Just two days earlier, Rodd presented to the Town Council, in a regular session, a residents' sponsored survey and report in opposition to the artificially lighted, eventide use of Cottone Field where it is now located.
Snow covered the ground. A half mile away, as the bus neared Bloomfield High from the east, the sight of the dark-encircled, lighted field evoked recollections of the cornfield surrounded ballfield in the "Field of Dreams" flick. A whisper of "if you build it, they will come", wafted lightly through the cabin. Some onboard would no doubt say that that is both a solution and a problem. All onboard were there to gather more information to fuel further discussions or to support their positions.
Unlike Wethersfield's Cottone Field which sits on poorly draining low-land, BHS's athletic field is cut into the side of a well-draining hillside. The field is bounded by the BHS to the west, school property to the south and closer residential properties to the north [Pix]and more distant dwelling units to the east. The group had to climb from the parking lot to the field.
The view of the snowy field under the 4, 90-foot tall light monopoles, was almost surreal[Pix]. One could almost conjure up images of 100m sprints on snowshoes or quarter mile relays on cross country skies. Because of the moisture in the air over and around the field, there was a light flare and glare about the field. Each of the four monopoles hold two horizontal rows of eight Musco light fixtures. The resulting 64 fixtures easily lighted the field and its surround track and the adjacent bleechers.
Nearby, McCarty used display boards to illustrate how the height of the poles additionally played an important role in limiting the spread of light beyond the area desired to be lighted.[Pix] Higher poles allow the fixtures to be tilted more downward, creating much less light pollution around an athletic facility. The converse is also true.
For the next hour, McCarty [Pix] fielded many questions from the group, a few of which were:
- ..How and where the lights and poles installed? [Four arrays, sixty feet from the edge of the field is average].
- ..What special considerations must be given to anticipated wind forces, usual and unusual? [Each installation is highly engineered to withstand the winds of the locale, average and much more.]
- ..What is the cost of a similar installation? [It depends on what you want and what you need to accomplish it.] On the bus ride to the field, one of the avid supporters remarked that "price is not a problem", hinting at an implied depth of commitment by their group.
- ..How well can the fixtures be "tweaked" to refine and thus further limit horizontal light spread into non-athletic areas? [Placement of the on-the-site assembled poles with arrays attached is critical but some fine adjustment is possible.]
- ..How long do the fixtures and bulbs in them last? [Each bulb can last about 3000 hours and would cost about $60 to replace.]
- ..What are some of the financial options to installing and maintaining the arrays? [Musco offers options: outright purchase, lease, lease-purchase, and maintenance plans.]
- ..What is the typical electrical usage requirements? [Depends, however Musco lights such as these have a "Multi-Watt" feature, allowing for reduced output during practice periods. Tony Laury demonstrated how the lighting can be switched to the lowered output mode.]
- ..Are there more than one lighting fixture available; what are their pro's and con's? [Top of the line is their TLC fixtures used here on this BHS field; a cheaper 'Level-8' fixture is also available.]
- ..How deep do the bases of the monopoles have to set in the ground? [These are set to 18 feet. Each base is a single, centripitally spun, reinforced concrete unit, which gets lowered into a ~2 foot wide, augered hole.]
- ..How close to the field of play can or should they be located? [Depends, but about 60 feet is an average.]
- ..How are the systems installed? [By a Musco-approved, local or regional contractor.]
- ..How tall can the lights be? [Based on the needs of the project up to the limits imposed by safety and local zoning regulations.][Pix]
- ..Are these systems warranteed? [Yes, in detail.]
The questions waned and the answers seemed to satisfy, appease or concern the visitors depending on their predisposition or their perspective on this issue. The trip back to Wethersfield left all with much more to consider in what will likely be a lively discussion before the final decisions are made. The bus pulled into the Town Hall lot about 9:30PM.
McCarty got in his SUV and had to drive to Albany, New York.
-W.N-
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