Research snapshot · Environmental · 13 September 2026
Dark sky lighting in Maine: 16 towns on the record, the pace easing
This page is a snapshot, cut 13 September 2026, of a topic that moves. Below is the shape of the movement, read from the towns' own meeting records, and the way to get a view of it that stays current.
Outdoor lighting standards limiting glare and light trespass: fixture and shielding requirements, curfews, and the ordinances adopting them.Our definition of the class.
Snapshot taken 13 September 2026, based on 19 dated municipal records flagged as dark sky lighting in Maine, spanning 16 municipalities. The topic moves; a later cut supersedes this page.
What this page is for one topic at state or national scope, told as a story: how it arrived, the shape of its movement, a dated snapshot of a moving record, and the door to a view of it that stays current. If it does not, write to us; that is what changes the next edition.
Source documents 3 of 19 on this page link straight to the town's own record. The rest are available on request. Ask for access.
The story so far
The record starts in South Portland, 8 June 2022. Since then 16 Maine towns have put the topic on a meeting record, the newest of them Gorham on 8 June 2026.
The last 90 days put 1 meeting on the record, well down from 3 in the 90 days before.
It runs through the rooms where budgets and ordinances are made: Planning Board, Ordinance Committee and All Boards.
The shape of the movement
Dated meetings on the record at this scope, quarter by quarter, and the same 90-day count as a rolling line, whose right-hand point is that number. Counts of documents, never a reading of what they decided.
Quarter
Meetings
Towns
Sep 2025 to Nov 2025
1
1
Dec 2025 to Feb 2026
8
8
Mar 2026 to May 2026
3
3
Jun 2026 to Sep 2026 (current)
1
1
a rolling 90-day total, so the right-hand point is that same 90-day count. The busiest stretch was Dec 2025 to Feb 2026, with 8 meetings.
The towns on the record16, earliest first
Every Maine town carrying the topic, the earliest first, each with its latest document.
South Portlandearliest 2022-06-08 · 1 meeting · latest 2022-06-08 · the posted document Regulation #5 - Standard Conditions of Approval - (Updated as of 06/08/2022)
Companies on this record53 companies, 18 documents
Named in the same documents that carry this topic, read from the record itself: the firms designing, building and advising the work, each with where the record places them:
darksky.orgBangor, Yarmouth
Nightingale TrustRockport
Allen’sOrland
Bangor Savings BankLewiston
BaykeeperCumberland
Brooks Hydro Logic LLCYork
BRSAPresque Isle
Bruce Hill Rd projectCumberland
Brunswick Development Corporation (BDC)Brunswick
Brunswick Topsham Land TrustBrunswick
CCLTCumberland
ChrisKennebunk
Chris Oster eiderKennebunk
ChurchSaco
CHURCHILL LLCBrunswick
CMCARockland
EliasRockland
FW Webb DevelopmentPresque Isle
Garbage to GardenKennebunk
Garbage to GardensCumberland
Great Pond Mountain TrustOrland
Harriet Beecher Stowe SchoolBrunswick
Illuminating Engineering Society of North America (IESNA)Falmouth
Ivy (Baykeeper)Cumberland
Kamp K-9Orland
Karahalios propertyFalmouth
LibraryRockland
MacDonaldBrunswick
Maine Coast Heritage TrustRockport
Maine School Administrative District #51Cumberland
And 23 more companies.
The documents naming each, and the threads they sit in, are the account view. If one of these is you, those are your projects on the record. Ask and we will show you every one, and the towns around them, as they move.
A snapshot of a moving record
Everything above is frozen at 13 September 2026; the topic is not. 13 more events on this topic carry no usable date and are counted, never dated. The counts follow where we read most: a town or a state absent here was not read at depth, and absence is not evidence the topic is absent there. A lighter-read state is not a ceiling; where you care about a region, pointing the system there is the first thing an account changes. How coverage is built, and its known limits: municipalalpha.com/methodology.
How we can tell you about it ongoing
We track this topic continuously; this page is one cut of it, taken 13 September 2026. An account turns the snapshot into a working view: every town and every document behind these counts, the thread on each matter as it develops, word of new meetings as they land on the record, your own states and topics side by side, and the data itself when you want it in a table. The towns above are the taste; what each is actually deciding, funding or stalling is the read an account carries.
Also at this scope: Dark sky lighting across the country. Counts and dates are computed from the documents on the record; the topic and its definition are ours. This page carries no subscriber content.